Hotfix 9.91 - Prohibition is cancelled/Groups are fixed for full use of rum

[Khendon]

i think the changes are good. some tweaking is needed i am sure, but only testing will show what and how.

 

i think that ANYTHING that gets ships out at sea is a good change. if bottles are too frequent then add something else. let us pick up passengers from a sunk ship, prisoners or civilians or both. must be taken to some port <somewhere>

 

dont make port battles the main event. it isnt a good enough...constant enough content generator.

 

you need to figure out a way to get ships out to sea running to and fro doing >stuff<. what that stuff is is entirely up to you. good luck.

[Sharden]

There were/are two things (maybe some more) that give the Pirates an advantage that regular nations don't have:

1) Switch to Pirate side.

2) Pirates can attack each other in order to escape in OW

 

 

I mentioned the easier switching, attacking in OW can be done by nations with the smuggler flag as well, as far as i know.

 

still,those are in no way comparable to the imbalance introduced with the 20% reload bonus against pirates.

 

The tagging is merely annyoing i guess (never used it myself and i wont) and the switching with all the help you get is only about keeping the blueprints.

 

So all in all, as long as pirates arent reworked, devs should refrain from introducing these potentialy game-breaking perks and handle pirates just like any other nation

 

I wouldnt even mind having Pirate vs Pirate disabled until Pirates become real pirates.

The bad thing here just is, that some small pirate mechanics are now in the game while most are still lacking, creating a really unbalanced faction (first it was considered much stronger than the rest, now it is arguably at a severe disadvantage)

Edited June 30, 2016 by Sharden

[Bach]

Crew costs!

Just did a 152 fleet mission in my Essex & my fleet of 2 Belle's ... here's the after battle profit/loss result's;

1) Essex: 6 kills, 2 Assists

2) Belle #1: 1 assist

3) Belle #2: 1 assist, 1 capture

Revenue

1) Damage & Kills: 108,311

2) Mission Comp: 5,000

3) Total Revenue 113,311

Expenses

1) Repairs: 8,393

2) Replacement Crew 153,000

3) Total Expenses 161,393

Profit/Loss (48,082)

OK I like the idea of having my own little fleet but given that they are prone to doing dumb things (like capturing ships & losing 3/4 of their crew), and now the cost of crew replacement I don't think I can afford to use them. Yesterday after about 7 or 8 battles I ended the day with about 400k less than I started with and that was with a winning record!

How are you replacing your crew and why?

If you hire the replacements from port = 500 gold/crewmen

If you buy med kits from port = 500 gold/crewmen

If you build med kits from farms = about 180 gold/crewmen

If you build med kits from fishing = about 120 gold/crewmen

So if you had built your own med kits you should have still made around 75-100k gold.

Building med kit's and repairs is a zero level crafting skill. Buying from port seems to be more of a last ditch effort and very expensive compared to player Econ methods.

I noticed yesterday that if I just waited over time my crew replaced themselves. Might be bugged. Going to test this again today. But I lost 22 crew and didn't replace. Teleported ports and sailed a hour running cargo. Looked back at total crew and it had refilled itself.

Edited June 30, 2016 by Bach

[Mrdoomed]

Then no one will use AI fleets cause of the great economical disadvantage using them.

A interesting feature that will die then.

Good. I hope its a quick death. Hate to sound harsh but now that capping a trade ship with ai escorts is a near impossible task unless you want to invest all night in it i have begun sinking not only the trade ship but his ai fleets in order to cost him his ass in gold.

All people do is bitch that pirates dont act like pirates BUT THE FEW OF US THAT DO FIND NOTHING BUT STUPID GAME MECHANICS IN OUR WAY. No wonder the others just attack ports, trying to do piracy or privateer work seems to be the developers most hated trade.

[Obi-Heed Kenobi]

How are you replacing your crew and why?

If you hire the replacements from port = 500 gold/crewmen

If you buy med kits from port = 500 gold/crewmen

If you build med kits from farms = about 180 gold/crewmen

If you build med kits from fishing = about 120 gold/crewmen

So if you had built your own med kits you should have still made around 75-100k gold.

Building med kit's and repairs is a zero level crafting skill. Buying from port seems to be more of a last ditch effort and very expensive compared to player Econ methods.

I noticed yesterday that if I just waited over time my crew replaced themselves. Might be bugged. Going to test this again today. But I lost 22 crew and didn't replace. Teleported ports and sailed a hour running cargo. Looked back at total crew and it had refilled itself.

Thanks for crunching these numbers. I meant to and kept forgetting.

[Bach]

Then no one will use AI fleets cause of the great economical disadvantage using them.

A interesting feature that will die then.

Not so.

He was using Belle's as fleeters. That's a lot of crew to put into a battle with AI brains. I ran several missions with x2 Niagara fleet. Told them to demast and when the target slowed I moved in got it focused on my tanked main ship and then told the Niagaras to blast it. I barely lost any crew.

Also the costs for replacing crew depend on method. 500g from port or 1/4th that cost player built.

[akd]

How are you replacing your crew and why?

If you hire the replacements from port = 500 gold/crewmen

If you buy med kits from port = 500 gold/crewmen

If you build med kits from farms = about 180 gold/crewmen

If you build med kits from fishing = about 120 gold/crewmen

So if you had built your own med kits you should have still made around 75-100k gold.

Building med kit's and repairs is a zero level crafting skill. Buying from port seems to be more of a last ditch effort and very expensive compared to player Econ methods.

I noticed yesterday that if I just waited over time my crew replaced themselves. Might be bugged. Going to test this again today. But I lost 22 crew and didn't replace. Teleported ports and sailed a hour running cargo. Looked back at total crew and it had refilled itself.

 

I fought 3-4 battles yesterday, losing 30 crew or so per battle.  Mostly I was sailing in a Trincomalee as a Rear Admiral.  I never once had to purchase crew in port.  After every battle, I was able to replenish my crew fully using the manage crew button on the OS.  Dragging the slider would replace my lost crew, drawing from my magic total pool of crew (they must swim out from shore).  My total pool would diminish, but either over time or when I returned to port, it seemed to replenish to max (or at least somehow I have not been steadily losing crew over time).  I suspect crew loss doesn't matter until you dip below your allotment of free crew without returning to port, which in turns means it only really matters if you are sailing a ship that maximizes crew use for your rank, if you have spread your pool across a fleet, or chose to play suicidally.

[FieryCross]

Whew tobacco production prices are wicked

[Mrdoomed]

I fought 3-4 battles yesterday, losing 30 crew or so per battle. Mostly I was sailing in a Trincomalee as a Rear Admiral. I never once had to purchase crew in port. After every battle, I was able to replenish my crew fully using the manage crew button on the OS. Dragging the slider would replace my lost crew, drawing from my magic total pool of crew (they must swim out from shore). My total pool would diminish, but either over time or when I returned to port, it seemed to replenish to max (or at least somehow I have not been steadily losing crew over time). I suspect crew loss doesn't matter until you dip below your allotment of free crew without returning to port, which in turns means it only really matters if you are sailing a ship that maximizes crew use for your rank, if you have spread your pool across a fleet, or chose to play suicidally.

Does crew auto replace in port ? I.e i have 800 crew but lose 120 from my gross total, do i have to buy them back or will they slowlh come back over time if im not in a rush?

I couldnt find out yesterday.

Whew tobacco production prices are wicked

Thanks to government taxes and regulations!

[SheepDip]

I went from Charleston to Cape Canaveral for stuff and got 1 bottle , but I didnt open it . I am glad I didnt because there is a great video of what to do with it and how to ship the stuff back using free ports :-}}  Gonna go treasure hunting tonite after work .....

 

[JimDandy]

How are you replacing your crew and why?

If you hire the replacements from port = 500 gold/crewmen

If you buy med kits from port = 500 gold/crewmen

If you build med kits from farms = about 180 gold/crewmen

If you build med kits from fishing = about 120 gold/crewmen

So if you had built your own med kits you should have still made around 75-100k gold.

Building med kit's and repairs is a zero level crafting skill. Buying from port seems to be more of a last ditch effort and very expensive compared to player Econ methods.

I noticed yesterday that if I just waited over time my crew replaced themselves. Might be bugged. Going to test this again today. But I lost 22 crew and didn't replace. Teleported ports and sailed a hour running cargo. Looked back at total crew and it had refilled itself.

 

Thanks I have not been keeping up with changes such as med kits & such... to be honest I have become so bored that I only play this game as a time burner, fighting ai battles. It now seems that in order to even do just that we have a lot more busy work rather than purposeful goals... oh well.

[SheepDip]

I cant even find tobacco , let alone buy any !!

[Kanay]

Sailed long distances trips for maybe 7 hours at total yesterday without a single bottle, today i got one after not even one hour, and a second one not even 10 minutes later, and a third one once coming back 1 hour later maybe, very close to my arrival destination port, while it isn't supposed to be like this after this little patch.

 

 

The loot was reduced, 1 single LH instead of 4 or more yesterday, extremely valuable, 1 gold upgrade ( very nice ) and some gold and silver coins on each, always this i won't have to do for notes so it's very welcome.   While i'm very happy to have found those bottles today after the frustration endured yesterday, i start to really hate RNG in this game, make it so after xxx tons of fish caught you get one bottle and basta, all will have equal chances.

 

 

Also anyone knows where to search for sharks ? could only get a couple once in front of my capital but sailed in deep and shallow waters around various loacations and nothing ... they should be not far from coasts at less than 150m deep wikipedia says .

[SheepDip]

I got 1 last night goin all the way down the Florida coast ;-}

[Jean Ribault]

I went from Charleston to Cape Canaveral for stuff and got 1 bottle , but I didnt open it . I am glad I didnt because there is a great video of what to do with it and how to ship the stuff back using free ports :-}}  Gonna go treasure hunting tonite after work .....

 

 

I picked up 2 or 3 bottles in a short time period myself with no effort last night.  I didn't open any yet, thought I'd pursue that later.  I'm glad they reduced the FBD (<---- frequency of bottle discovery   ) though, because it makes for a more valuable object.

Edited June 30, 2016 by Jean Ribault

[Jean Ribault]

...

 

Also anyone knows where to search for sharks ? could only get a couple once in front of my capital but sailed in deep and shallow waters around various loacations and nothing ... they should be not far from coasts at less than 150m wikipedia says .

 

 

Last night on PVP2 we were posting all our catches real-time.  A number of strange fishies came up, including sharks.  They're out there.

 

As a sidebar, I think if there are massive gold returns on some more infrequent / rare fish, then this could actually cause more people to just go out and sail for no other reason than to go out fishing looking for their retirement nestegg.  For you pvp lovers who can't get enough jumping innocent traders, well now you got innocent fishermen to enjoy too. 

[Hethwill]

Fishermen are indeed innocent. Traders are the most guilty.

[DeRuyter]

I am on the bad side of RNG for bottles I guess - none discovered on trip down FL coast, but I did catch a bunch of sharks!

 

Hoping for better bottle luck today or maybe I'll just sell all my sharks!

 

Thanks for the hotfix on the group bug so quickly!

[Kanay]

Last night on PVP2 we were posting all our catches real-time.  A number of strange fishies came up, including sharks.  They're out there.

 

As a sidebar, I think if there are massive gold returns on some more infrequent / rare fish, then this could actually cause more people to just go out and sail for no other reason than to go out fishing looking for their retirement nestegg.  For you pvp lovers who can't get enough jumping innocent traders, well now you got innocent fishermen to enjoy too. 

Will have to continue explore and start to mark a map with things i catch and where but those damn sharks are afraid of me it seems.

 

This said i made not far from 250k worth with fishing today, just with the smelly fish... waiting for the moment the shops will reach 25k units and not buy anymore the meat or raw fishes.

 

I'd like to craft barrels and load them next to large quantities of salt into my traders, then keep the transformed meat safe from going rotten inside the barrels with salt, will add more interesting game-play, fresh fish had to come back to ports before 3-4 days, meat stored in barrels with salt can wait way longer, also select what type of fishes my crew will keep and what they will throw out over board when not transforming the meat, and price for fishes adjusted, 5k for a flyingfish that weights 0.5 only, same for sharks or manta ray ... It ain't fugu fish  ... and some others will be sold for 5 gold while having way more meat ...

 

and about weights, one raw oak log is 2.5 but a single tuna is 5  ? o_O

 

It will probably be tweaked but there is a lot of stuff possible to be done to make it really more interesting than now.

 

 

 

Fishermen are indeed innocent. Traders are the most guilty.

I am in a trader but only fishing, what am i ?  

[akd]

Mixed carronade + long gun loadouts are broken yet again.

 

1. if you have both carronades and long guns on a broadside and you switch from the current ammo (ball, chain or grape) to double shot, it shows your long guns reloading with double, but when you fire the actual shots (as recorded in shot log) are the previous ammo type, not just the carronades.  My dreams of mixed carronade grape + long gun double broadside into sterns at close range were dashed. Please fix!

 

2. and although the shots from the guns show in log as default, not double, they have the trajectory of double shot (or this situation is causing re-emergence of the old bug where guns get limited to carronade max range).

[Jean Ribault]

Will have to continue explore and start to mark a map with things i catch and where but those damn sharks are afraid of me it seems.

 

This said i made not far from 250k worth with fishing today, just with the smelly fish... waiting for the moment the shops will reach 25k units and not buy anymore the meat or raw fishes.

 

NICE  

 

I'd like to craft barrels and load them next to large quantities of salt into my traders, then keep the transformed meat safe from going rotten inside the barrels with salt, will add more interesting game-play, fresh fish had to come back to ports before 3-4 days, meat stored in barrels with salt can wait way longer, also select what type of fishes my crew will keep and what they will throw out over board when not transforming the meat, and price for fishes adjusted, 5k for a flyingfish that weights 0.5 only, same for sharks or manta ray ... It ain't fugu fish  ... and some others will be sold for 5 gold while having way more meat ...

 

and about weights, one raw oak log is 2.5 but a single tuna is 5  ? o_O

 

It will probably be tweaked but there is a lot of stuff possible to be done to make it really more interesting than now.

 

 

From a purely empirical perspective I usually rank resources in order with respect to profit potential for my current fleet in any one location.  Profit potential is easy, since it's:

 

PP = (max potential sell - min actual buy) x (ship hold capacity) / (resource weight factor)

 

So for example PP-gold is 364,800 for an LGV or PP-iron is 350,400.  Ironically PP for Lignum Vitae is only 240K even though it profits 125 a unit, higher than either gold or iron.  Gold will yield a bit more than iron but iron might be more plenteous and a shorter run in better waters.  It's partly empirical and partly trade strategy.  And multiple mixed resources works in some locations too.  For the fishing I haven't had a chance to figure all that out yet, but based on the profits you are reporting from first day, I'm thinking there's quite a potential there too.

 

I believe that the devs have all these numbers balanced out and figured as I show above, because they seem for the most part appear to be similar effort for results.

Edited June 30, 2016 by Jean Ribault

[Ned Loe]

Dear Devs,

 

When I place mouse over Fish I get instant Info about it. This is very annoying and is distracting other commands and view . Please put a 2-3 seconds timer before displaying description. This means I have to hold my mouse over Item/Fish for 3 seconds in order to get description. 

 

Thanks

[Lannes]

I have been playing yesterday and today and find that I am already wondering whether this whole CREW caper is worth it. I have lost 150 out of 650. It means I can only crew my Constitution. Crew are so expensive that after repairs and replenishing crew there's not a lot of profit left after a mission.

Ah, but there are fish aplenty! (Perhaps this is now Naval Fishing Action? Pardon my chagrin.)

It is still a superb game--I love the search and finding of WRECKS!

But I do hope we have some more balancing with hotfixes, etc. Perhaps, a much cheaper crew. Or, as akd experienced, the crew might replenish by itself. Anything is possible!

Edited June 30, 2016 by Lannes

[Teamski]

Portable soup, for all love!

 

 

This!

[Vernon Merrill]

I have been playing yesterday and today and find that I am already wondering whether this whole CREW caper is worth it. I have lost 150 out of 650. It means I can only crew my Constitution. Crew are so expensive that after repairs and replenishing crew there's not a lot of profit left after a mission.

Ah, but there are fish aplenty! (Perhaps this is now Naval Fishing Action? Pardon my chagrin.)

It is still a superb game--I love the search and finding of WRECKS!

But I do hope we have some more balancing with hotfixes, etc. Perhaps, a much cheaper crew. Or, as akd experienced, the crew might replenish by itself. Anything is possible!

 

 

It also means you could have sailed your connie all day and still have plenty to replenish your losses and be fully crewed...