Allow ship deliveries between outposts

[Ungern85]

Allow the transfer of ships between the outposts . The transfered vessel act  as a ship AI ship between the two ports and can therefore be attacked . Authorize one transfer per day per port . The player must be in port in wich he want do that. The vessel transferred can be loaded. Players accept the risks or decide to escort their ships ... 

[Old Tom]

I didn't vote but I have a different idea.

 

Rather than transferring cargo and ships via AI why not get a player to do this?

 

It could work something like this.

You make a contract to transport some cargo from A to B

I would buy your cargo from A and sail it to B

on arrival at B you would buy it back at the sale price + 20/25%

If I get intercepted and sunk or captured on the way I would lose my ship and my money and you would lose your cargo, so the risk is shared.

This would work the same with sending ships.

 

There would of course need to be some mechanism built into the game so that once a contract has been issued and accepted neither party can back out of it to ensure players are not using this as a way of selling their good or indeed getting goods on the cheap.

[Marcomies]

 

I didn't vote but I have a different idea.

 

Rather than transferring cargo and ships via AI why not get a player to do this?

 

It could work something like this.

You make a contract to transport some cargo from A to B

I would buy your cargo from A and sail it to B

on arrival at B you would buy it back at the sale price + 20/25%

If I get intercepted and sunk or captured on the way I would lose my ship and my money and you would lose your cargo, so the risk is shared.

This would work the same with sending ships.

 

There would of course need to be some mechanism built into the game so that once a contract has been issued and accepted neither party can back out of it to ensure players are not using this as a way of selling their good or indeed getting goods on the cheap.

 

Arrangements like this are already possible in the game but if actual mechanic like this was added the it would be hard to make sure that it is not too easily exploitable for real use.

 

With suggested system the problem would be people who just take the contract and sail their ship to their pirate (or enemy nation) buddies to capture and return. People like this would probably make a significant portion of the people who would actually take transportation missions.

 

If the cargo was insured, it would be easy to have one person make the mission, another takes the cargo and lets the pirate buddy capture it. First person would then collect the insurance money and the pirate would return the ship and cargo to original owners and the same could be repeated with the same ship and goods infinitely.

 

I the transporter had to pay for loss of cargo, the system would be harder to exploit by the transporter. Delivery contracts could still be made with the aim of sending delivery ships towards the pirates friends of the maker of the contract. This system would probably hardest to exploit but I don't know how many people would actually be interested in taking the risk of paying for the cargo just for a reasonable profit. You might as well move your own cargo for the same risk and better profit.

Edited April 7, 2016 by Marcomies

[KrakkenSmacken]

Missed question.

 

Should the sent ship travel over the OW like a regular ship?

 

To that I would answer yes.

 

Our characters already "hire" crew, as well as represent more hiring with labor hours.

 

Why not hire a captain to sail your ship from port to port?

 

If done this way, a good method for limiting it would be that your crew capacity be reduced by the crew capacity of the sent ship, until that ship arrives or is sunk.

 

It also potentially opens up a higher level of player, one that accumulates additional crew limitations that are above that required for any single ship.

 

I would also include in this feature the ability to "agent smith" into any ship you own that is on the OW.  That way if your online and your ship gets tagged, you could take command and have fun/pvp trying to avoid losing the ship/dura, rather than an AI that is entirely predictable.

Edited April 7, 2016 by KrakkenSmacken

[KrakkenSmacken]

Thrown in my vote.

I do however have to question why so many says yes to cargo? This will decrease the risk of moving valuable cargo, which in my eyes should be risky.

 

Just my thought on the subject really.

I voted to allow moving of cargo, but could not put in the caveat because it was not included in the poll.

 

That caveat being that all transports must actually travel the OW, and take the risks associated with that travel.

 

Right now teleports are being used, myself included, to avoid the risk of open world travel.  It's kinda weird to have piles and piles of restrictions like TP only every 4 hours, TP with ship only to home port, send to outpost but only of captured ships, send shipments but only to Free ports, etc. At the same time a major point of  "real" travel as being some sort of sacrosanct holy grail, even though it in large part can be totally bypassed through that one TP to home port with cargo anyway.   

 

In awareness of Admins request to state "why" on features.

 

Ultimately I would love to see fleet management be a thing, almost an RTS style of play of OW being possible, rather than requiring sailing from place to place every time you wanted to do something.  Done right and you could do away with teleports all together, or replaced by something that lets you get out of being stuck, or limited to a specific type of ship. 

 

I would really love to send out a patrol in an area, and if it encounters a target or gets pulled into a fight, simply take over the ship for the duration.

 

The question is, are you "just" the captain of a ship, or are you the actual "rank" of your name.  A British "Rear Admiral"  would not be expected to captain his own trader cutters.

 

BTW: I will be happy regardless, but I honestly think the game would be better and with more PVP action if players had tools that put them in the action sooner. Sending out more than one ship and being able to enter a battle on any ship that encounters activity would be one such way.

Edited April 7, 2016 by KrakkenSmacken

[KrakkenSmacken]

To be clear - I only support moving ships with cargo if they actually traverse the open world.

 

IMHO the current "teleport to outpost" mechanic must be gotten rid of before this game can truly become what it should be.

 

However, I recognize that people do not want to spend huge amounts of time "just sailing" in the OW, so the compromise solution is some kind of autopilot feature, to have ships move through the OW without player interaction.

 

Personally I would like to see "teleport" restricted in all cases the same way it is with outposts.  Your brain travels, but not any in world asset.

 

The question is, are you a person in the world, or an entity that acts on your world assets?  I prefer to think in terms of the latter.

[surfimp]

I would also include in this feature the ability to "agent smith" into any ship you own that is on the OW.  That way if your online and your ship gets tagged, you could take command and have fun/pvp trying to avoid losing the ship/dura, rather than an AI that is entirely predictable.

I've thought about something similar and think it could be cool. If you had a bunch of ships moving through the OW, it would almost become like a RTS... you'd "beam" into whatever ship was in trouble, fight the fight, then go back to your command overview screen. You'd still have the option to sail per current practice, too, but it would let you have more stuff going on. I think it could be interesting and exciting!

[surfimp]

Personally I would like to see "teleport" restricted in all cases the same way it is with outposts.  Your brain travels, but not any in world asset.

Yes, this is what I was trying to get at. I feel the same way you do - I'd like it so your player character can teleport all over the place between outposts (per currently), but the ships themselves have to be sent through the OW - in all instances, whether it's "send to capital" or "send to outpost" (i.e. after capturing a ship).

[KrakkenSmacken]

I've thought about something similar and think it could be cool. If you had a bunch of ships moving through the OW, it would almost become like a RTS... you'd "beam" into whatever ship was in trouble, fight the fight, then go back to your command overview screen. You'd still have the option to sail per current practice, too, but it would let you have more stuff going on. I think it could be interesting and exciting!

 

A similar tool used in tracking your clan mates, where it shows location (Sea, Harbor, Battle) of your fleet, and a selection would transport you into the ship, seems like it would be a fairly easy thing to add. 

 

The already have change command code written for when you [X] to capture, and we already hop in and out of battle instances, so it's does not appear to be something that would be hard to code.

[Vaan De Vries]

Why would you propose this as a Dutch player? You want to be zerged by the sprawling empires that now will never become overextended?

 

He is proposing more convinient way of using "send to oupost feature". If we have the instrument to instantaneously send capped ship to any outpost - proposed feature should exist too. Or go all way realistic and made you transfer a prize team to capped vessel and tow it into nearest outpost. But wait, we have magic crew, that replenish itself after battle, making no sense of the prize team...

 

I'd love to see the "send to outpost" only let you choose the nearest outpost. 

 

I've watched the French the last few days and I see pavels, bellonas etc enter battles against traders, then the trader comes out of that battle. They're building their war fleet in Fort Royal, and then teleport it west. 

 

I doubt a single Santissima, Victory or Pavel was ever sailed that way. 

 

Your statement being the point of... You sincerely thinks no one else is doing it currently with "cap the nearest AI ship"? 

The only thing Hugo propose is to legitimize with MONEY and DELAY what everyone is alreadt doing with capped traders.

[codyproxy]

I don't get why so many players think the 'move assets by AI in OW' is such a good idea. The risk is way too high it'll fall into enemy hands, and most people therefore won't use it.

[KrakkenSmacken]

I don't get why so many players think the 'move assets by AI in OW' is such a good idea. The risk is way too high it'll fall into enemy hands, and most people therefore won't use it.

 

Ha!

 

A primarily PvP player would probably eat any $$$ risk to avoid having to haul stuff from place to place.  Simply log in and start the shipments when server pop is low, and focus on local routes so they don't have to travel very far.  

 

I do wonder however what % of AI trips (Trade ship from port A-> B  are a actually interrupted. I suspect very few as an average.

Edited April 11, 2016 by KrakkenSmacken

[surfimp]

I do wonder however what % of AI trips (Trade ship from port A-> B  are a actually interrupted. I suspect very few as an average.

 

Presumably more would be intercepted if there was an actual RVR/PVP aspect to capturing them, but even then, I suspect many would get through just fine. Especially if they are not on trade routes that go into or out of a national capital while carrying "contraband" cargo

Edited April 11, 2016 by surfimp

[Marcomies]

The main problem I see with being able to lets AI sail with the cargo is that there would be little to no reason for players to sails traders ever again. It would be much more convenient to have the AI sail a trader and escort it with warship.

Edited April 11, 2016 by Marcomies

[surfimp]

The main problem I see with being able to lets AI sail with the cargo is that there would be little to no reason for players to sails traders ever again. It would be much more convenient to have the AI sail a trader and escort it with warship.

 

Oh, I'd give them reasons to sail manually, let there be no doubt about that

 

However, right now they don't sail them anyways, they teleport them.

 

Which keeps the resources & goods out of the OW, for the most part, and prevents privateering/piracy from being a viable gameplay mode (as there is little to no ability to interdict enemy trade, certainly not in a meaningful RVR sense). It also makes trading a nearly zero risk activity - one of the few such activities in the game.

 

Changing that - while still allowing ships to be sailed "automatically" (i.e. not requiring people to sail long hauling journeys through the OW if they don't find that fun) - would be a nice improvement for the game.

[KrakkenSmacken]

The main problem I see with being able to lets AI sail with the cargo is that there would be little to no reason for players to sails traders ever again. It would be much more convenient to have the AI sail a trader and escort it with warship.

 

So, given the choice, players would choose something else, and that's a bad thing?

 

EDIT: Why is everyone so set on forcing people to play the way they want others to play?  Sand box is supposed to be open, and you get to pick the fun you have, not "play my way or go away", or "I know you don't like doing this, but the game will somehow be magically better if you are forced to".

Edited April 11, 2016 by KrakkenSmacken

[Marcomies]

Oh, I'd give them reasons to sail manually, let there be no doubt about that

 

However, right now they don't sail them anyways, they teleport them.

 

Which keeps the resources & goods out of the OW, for the most part, and prevents privateering/piracy from being a viable gameplay mode (as there is little to no ability to interdict enemy trade, certainly not in a meaningful RVR sense). It also makes trading a nearly zero risk activity - one of the few such activities in the game.

 

Changing that - while still allowing ships to be sailed "automatically" (i.e. not requiring people to sail long hauling journeys through the OW if they don't find that fun) - would be a nice improvement for the game.

 

Well I'm pretty sure that most players would still find it more effective to escort the trader with a warship than trying to fight/run from the pirates/privateers in the trader 

 

I do fully agree with the trading (and as a result, piracy/commercial raiding) being completely broken thanks to the teleport to capital and the decreasing amount of traders in general as a result of player production (which will get worse as the npc port production is removed). I have suggested removing the teleportation in couple threads and made suggestion thread on how to decentralize the production and trade from the immediate vicinity of nation capitals.

Edited April 11, 2016 by Marcomies

[KrakkenSmacken]

Well I'm pretty sure that most players would still find it more effective to escort the trader with a warship than trying to fight/run from the pirates/privateers in the trader 

 

I do fully agree with the trading (and as a result, piracy/commercial raiding) being completely broken thanks to the teleport to capital and the decreasing amount of traders in general as a result of player production (which will get worse as the npc port production is removed). I have suggested removing the teleportation in couple threads and made suggestion thread on how to decentralize the production and trade from the immediate vicinity of nation capitals.

 

Not arguing against, but how would you suggest handling nations that are so far back on their heels as to not have any stable source of necessities? If you move the ports for these items too far away, you risk a nation completely collapsing economically.

 

How do you make the game appealing to player to start by accidentally joining a nation already on the ropes?

[Marcomies]

So, given the choice, players would choose something else, and that's a bad thing?

 

EDIT: Why is everyone so set on forcing people to play the way they want others to play?  Sand box is supposed to be open, and you get to pick the fun you have, not "play my way or go away", or "I know you don't like doing this, but the game will somehow be magically better if you are forced to".

On the contrary, I would personally love to be able to just escort my traders instead of sailing them myself but I know that a lot of dedicated traders/crafters would complain about being forced to level their military level in order to trade properly (lets face it, two stern chasers or couple carronades in nowhere near as good anti-piracy measure as an escort frigate). I have seen even the crew demand of Trader Snow cause annoyance in some players.

 

 

Not arguing against, but how would you suggest handling nations that are so far back on their heels as to not have any stable source of necessities? If you move the ports for these items too far away, you risk a nation completely collapsing economically.

 

How do you make the game appealing to player to start by accidentally joining a nation already on the ropes?

 

Not destroying weak nations' ability to craft ships is actually important part of the suggestion I made. As far as I know the devs are/were planning reducing the number of different materials produced in each port which would have disastrous consequences for small nations.

 

http://forum.game-labs.net/index.php?/topic/12992-decentralizing-the-player-economy-to-all-over-the-map/

[Captain]

Good polls. 

 

You can already teleport ships to outposts, instantaneously, so there's really no objection to be made. 

 

Just replace the time sink cap-swap-teleport mechanic with money and a transport period and we're golden IMO

Edited April 11, 2016 by Captain

[KrakkenSmacken]

On the contrary, I would personally love to be able to just escort my traders instead of sailing them myself but I know that a lot of dedicated traders/crafters would complain about being forced to level their military level in order to trade properly (lets face it, two stern chasers or couple carronades in nowhere near as good anti-piracy measure as an escort frigate). I have seen even the crew demand of Trader Snow cause annoyance in some players.

 

 

 

Not destroying weak nations' ability to craft ships is actually important part of the suggestion I made. As far as I know the devs are/were planning reducing the number of different materials produced in each port which would have disastrous consequences for small nations.

 

http://forum.game-labs.net/index.php?/topic/12992-decentralizing-the-player-economy-to-all-over-the-map/

 

 

"dedicated traders/crafters would complain about being forced to level their military level in order to trade properly"  resonates with me.  If I was a trader that would in fact drive me pretty nuts.

 

The are only answer I can think of would be to have a way for players to hire player escorts in some fashion.  The problem being splitting of profits.

 

A possible answer to that, although I am very certain there will be quite a few people who hate the idea before I say it, would be to allow traders to hire AI, that in the event of being intercepted, PvP players could "Agent smith" into and take over for.  Give players a chance within the first few minutes of battle to drop into the AI ship, which they are then punted out of when the fight is over.

 

In this way a trader can hire AI escorts to begin with, but get the real protection that players offer. As a PvP player I would be happy to help settle these encounters, even with minimal rewards, simply because the risk was essentially zero, and odds are the fight would at least be interesting from the point of view of trying to let the trade ship escape.

 

On the economy stuff, I have suggested before that the AI traders should be registered to and operate near to specific cities, and that the goods they carry are either what the city produces, or consumes.  In this way nations on the ropes would know what areas they need to target in order to supply their shortages.

Edited April 11, 2016 by KrakkenSmacken

[Pagan Pete]

Magically delivering ships eliminates PVP opportunities.

 

Ye want it there, sail it there.

[Jeheil]

The cost for 'robot' deliveries should be proportional to the value of the ship and its assets.

 

Now the BIG question is, should the ship be actually visible in transit...and attackable !! / capturable....

 

Could you hire escorts.....oooooo

[Bommel]

Why not make it so that you can hire a NPC to sail your ship like they do in fleet. This way you would be able to reposition your ships but it would require you to sail alongside with them.

[Severin Norbi]

I would suggest that the ships that are sent to an outpost have to be sailed by the AI. Then the delivery risk costing a dura.