[Serious] Server Health

[Barbancourt]

24 minutes ago, Macjimm said:

I thought the same thing, but have heard an explanation that this is an MMO.  Players should coordinate and protect fellow nationals.  People who like sailing should choose safe areas and safe times.  Players  should work together within their nation to make it difficult for the hunters to patrol inside the borders of a capital region.

 

That would make the game into a chore that you'd have to do according to someone else's schedule.  I follow you around for 3 hours of hauling, you follow me around for 3 hours of hauling, we follow Dave around for 3 hours of hauling, let's sit outside Bob's missions for 3 hours, patrol the regions for 3 hours, etc.  People want to do their thing in a time effective manner, not convoy all day. 

 

[Cmdr RideZ]

13 hours ago, admin said:

People move on to new entertainment and come back when you created something new and exciting. 

So eventually everyone will leave to new games (ours included). And its ok. 

its a journey. 

PvP players are long happy just because they can shoot other people.  PvE players are heavy, as they come to game and leave it once they have gone through the content.

I was not actually planning to leave from NA, I was planning to play this for years.  You just suddenly changed the game so that it is basically unplayable utter crap.  Change it back please.  You still have time before launch.  Your journey took you really far, but then you came hard down.  Climb back up please.  Naval Action wont die if you do right choices.

...

Before Naval Action, I was playing Elite Dangerous.  When I started to play it, I noticed that it is a HC PvE grind game.  I noticed that everything is just repeating itself, not much content really.  Took like 3 days to notice it.  I played it a lot for a year.  I was thinking that devs will fix it, there are things that are so obvious to fix that of course they will fix those.  They never did the most obvious things.  All I knew quit the game, I still believed that they will change it.  Well, they never did.

I found NA, you had already so many things correctly that were F*ed up in ED.  I was thinking that "Oh why Elite Dangerous cannot have this kind of PvP as well".  You know, you F*ed up NA pretty bad for me.  You in the end took Elite Dangerous path and you have HC PvE grind game in your hands.  You have better PvP, but it is so heavy PvE grind that PvP players do not want to touch your game any more.

Happy sheep does not mean that you will have happy wolves.

...

List of things to do...

1. Test signaling perk globally.  You have to do something for ganks and zergs.

2. Use similar system as flag system.  I wrote here 1 year ago maybe, that hostility does not fly because it is PvE grind.  This never came in your mind?  One big reason why people left, is this PvE grind.

3. Multiple repair kits in battles, Mass > Skill.  This simply does not work.  It creates shitty PvP.  Many has been telling you this, you did nothing?

4. Combat Mark prices for ships are too high.

5. Ship Knowledge can be HC grind, but then bonuses from books cannot be big.  Or Ship Knowledge grind is fastly done and bonuses are big.  Small bonuses create more historical and realistic feeling.  I recommend that you decrease grind and bonuses.

6. Upgrades should have small bonuses. Add also upgrade rare materials in game, so that those are more common.  You really do not understand that this serves absolutely and only that 1% of your HC players.

7. Your crafters and traders first idea failed.  Do not follow EVE.  Back to affordable ships.

8. We need 5 times more ships in this game, so that we reach similar levels of PvP as we had before.  Do you want that people always just dare to sail to PvP in a Surprise?  It should have been ringing the bells immediately when you saw that army of Surprises.

9. Getting tired to write this always..  You have read so many good ideas from here, and many are not even mine.  You still dont do anything.

...

People also get bored to games because those SUCK.

NA has not been even released, people are not bored to it.  You as a developer might be bored to it.  It is dying because you do stupid decisions, and that is the only reason.  It does not just die itself.  It is all your fault that this game dies.  There have been many people telling you so many good things.  You are just so incredibly stubborn.

I have seen all your nice posts there where you explain what next.  You understand that those things probably will fail as well.  Why?  Because Death Penalty is so high that people do not dare to sail to PvP.  Put this fact in your F*ing thick skull already.  What is so hard to understand in this?  When you join this with zerg&gank PvP, you have failed, like we all know.

Your game sucks because you, yourself, and only because of you.  You make bad decisions and the game is sinking.  If you made good decisions, everyone would be playing.

...

Right now there is no game like old Naval Action, not even Naval Action today is as good as that was.  I always thought you would be making it just better and better, but we went opposite.  I know plenty of players who are hoping that you fix your shit.

...

For many, this has to be possible...

They come home after work, feed their kids and do their stuff.  Evening comes and they have time for themselves, they login.  They say hello for their clan and ask whats up.  They buy a flag and sail to PvP.  This is how game was working for many in 2016.  You and only you F*ed it, none got bored, everyone wanted more.

These same guys, they do not want to grind bots for hostility.  It is a F*ing surprise right?  THEY DO NOT WANT TO SHOOT BOTS, THEY DO NOT WANT PVE.  Put this in your freaking thick skull as well.  It is not so damn hard to understand this.

They do not want to grind missions or bid from rare upgrade materials in ports.  They want WAR.  How the hell is this so F*ing hard to understand?  It is obvious they want Naval ACTION, they want WAR.  Are we entertained?  Well this is not gladiator, this is SERF.  Unfortunately playing a serf like we do in real life, is not what we want from our entertainment.  Oh, is this also so freaking hard to understand?

True, there are players who want to play a serf.  The % of these players is not high enough to make it to be #1 in a game.  You failed here, you made it to be #1.

Crafting repair kits, I understand your point.  Did you know that you could have left this part to be designed later?  It was priority #1000.  Old system for repair kits was better, because you did not have to be a serf once more.  You bought your repair kits and you sailed to WAR.  Things that you do are not making this game better.

For example capturing ships.  We can capture ships, we cannot capture ships, we can capture X rated ships, we cannot capture ships, we can capture... ... You do this because once again your best friend, Admiral Carbear Craft And Trade.  This person, stop listening him already.  There is a high change for following...  If we could capture every ship, but every ship would have a random build -> We would still craft ships.  ... Omg?!  Seriously?!  Cannot be!?  ...  But it is.  It is because you may have to grind 100 missions to get that specific ship you want, or you can craft it directly.  Which one you take?  I would craft my ships.  Lets agree now that you do not waste even a second more to this question, ok?  We can now capture ships up to X rate and thats it.  You can consider this again in far future, but before launch, do not waste your time.  We might get this game done one day if you would not waste time to useless stuff like this.

...

What ever you do for the next, make sure that it will support and increase the amount of PvP.  Make sure that most of the time we are shooting each other.  When people are tired and they login after work, make sure they come to Naval Action, and that they do not have to login back to serfdom.

I am not bored, I know plenty of guys who are not bored.  I want that you succeed, we want that you succeed.  I am not playing Naval Action, they are not playing Naval Action, but just because the current game sucks.  We are waiting that you fix it, we are not in the game, but we are here and waiting.  Hoping to play again one day.

[Rhodry Heidenrich]

I appreciate what the spirit of the thread was, initially, but as we can see by the way it progressed that there still seems to be too much disparity in how certain groups each want to play the game, which makes it difficult to come together in an attempt to make our small community better than it is. It's hard for a small community such as PvP-Global to come together to make things more fun for all, when we can't sit down at a table without using our spoons to catapult peas at each other. 

 

[Hethwill]

1 hour ago, Jarlath Morrow said:

I think this last point is a good one. This game is excellent at letting one play an age of sail captain. But that was a profession that left one at sea for months at a time - many players don't have time for extended play sessions (or have time only certain days of the week).

Yes. Requires time investment to do it all I think. Maybe mechanics to simulate career paths could've really helped... at some point... instead of expecting players to create something out of the entropia of liberty.

 

 

[VirtuallyIdiotic]

1 hour ago, The Red Duke said:

Yes. Requires time investment to do it all I think. Maybe mechanics to simulate career paths could've really helped... at some point... instead of expecting players to create something out of the entropia of liberty.

 

 

Would be a nice addition to war companies *nudge nudge wink wink*

[Barbancourt]

1 hour ago, Cmdr RideZ said:

Before Naval Action, I was playing Elite Dangerous.  When I started to play it, I noticed that it is a HC PvE grind game.  I noticed that everything is just repeating itself, not much content really.  Took like 3 days to notice it.  I played it a lot for a year.  I was thinking that devs will fix it, there are things that are so obvious to fix that of course they will fix those.  They never did the most obvious things.  All I knew quit the game, I still believed that they will change it.  Well, they never did.

Heh, I enjoy the PVE game in Elite a lot.  In Elite there are always new places to go, more systems to take over and new factions to promote.  Flying never gets old.  (interdictions get VERY old though)  On the other hand PVE in NA is pretty much just about grinding money and XP the same way every day with no purpose beyond watching the numbers in the corner of the screen increase. When the NA server is down I'm flying in Elite promoting my pet factions and updating system info.  I don't like PvP in Elite at all, though. 

 

[BallsOfSteel]

5 hours ago, Davos Seasworth said:

I felt like camping a factions capital did significant damage to the server's population. People whos capital is being camped reduce their play time or take breaks.

Yes the weak gankers doing this will kill the game guaranteed and they are too thick headed to realise what they are doing. 

. I personally dont live in a capitol but visit when i need to. 

 

[Juan Alfonso]

@Teutonic I admire your commitment. The problem I see with a thunder dome of sorts is that, it was tried before on PvP2. I cannot remember the exact date but the nations all decided that Tumbado would be the place to go and get a good fight. And for a long while, it worked.

However this idea of a thunder dome to break the hug box can easily be ruined by the groups of people who use it, last time it ended due to a pure distrust of one another and that was it. Maybe I'm being pessimistic about the success of an arrangement such as this but I do have doubts. People gotta learn to overlook past transgressions, lest we all end up like the Dwarves in Warhammer with our big book of grudges

Good Luck. Hope something can work out.

J.A. de Castella

 

[Duncan McFail]

6 hours ago, Slamz said:

You refuse to PvP until you have 5 slots unlocked.

Naw. We just need a few slots. And actual ships that can keep up with yours. Problem is we have tons of heavy 1st rates. We have lots of them spread all around the map. But there of no use against French because they just run from them, try to separate our smaller ships from our big ships, kill off the smaller force, and then go for the big ships when they don't have support. And we're not going to play like that. Pirates get a group of 5th rates to kill your smaller group of 5ths and you kite them back to a free town, come out in bigger ships, and stomp them. We don't play by your rules and we don't fight on your terms. 

[Vllad]

12 minutes ago, Duncan McFail said:

We don't play by your rules and we don't fight on your terms. 

I could respect this if the fighting part actually occurred. 

[Chijohnaok]

17 hours ago, admin said:

imagine being a frigate captain during peace time

From reading the Patrick O;Brian and Dewey Lambdin novels my impression of peace time was that frigate captains sat around at half pay.  They were a nuisance to their wives....they went to the Admiralty office every few weeks looking for work, then they came back home and pestered their wives again.  Their highlight was when war finally broke out again. 

Fun times I'm sure.   

Edited August 11, 2017 by Chijohnaok

[Bach]

Back to topic

The teams need to get mixed up/consolidated if we want each nation to be viable in each style of play. RvR, PvP, Econ and time zones.

If you want a shrunken map all we need do is get each competing nation a port near the center of the map that no one captures.  This is essentially a shrunken map.

RvR is relatively meaningless as we can all still build ships and such even if we only have the home county. If you want players to invest the time to RvR there needs to be some reward to it. Make an ante of gold or whatever to a winnable pot and let players contest over that somehow. No one is actually going to start RvR just because you wait and wait and wait for them too. They either see value in that style of play or they don't. Spreading out the RvR players will certainly help.

PvP needs ships on the waters and more players willing to take a risk.  Again, spreading out such minded players will certainly help.

I'm sorry but on Global we just don't have the population to support x8 nations competitively.  We need to be willing to move to a smaller number to create competitive nations.

France cannot really ally with Pirates.  This only looks good from the RvR conquest board. In reality and under the current server conditions it would create an almost unstoppable total war machine.  The division would need to be by play styles and time zones.

 

 

Edited August 11, 2017 by Bach

[Teutonic]

22 minutes ago, Bach said:

Back to topic

The teams need to get mixed up/consolidated if we want each nation to be viable in each style of play. RvR, PvP, Econ and time zones.

If you want a shrunken map all we need do is get each competing nation a port near the center of the map that no one captures.  This is essentially a shrunken map.

 

 

This is the basis for a "Thunderdome."

Thunderdome is a term used in Eve Online that essentially was a Region or place in space (Regions are huge in eve online compared to naval action) that almost every major Alliance/Corporation would descend onto and it caused a HUGE deal of PvP and content. the Major alliances would all agree not to attack each others systems or structures and instead just do straight ship v ship PvP (NA version of this would be to not engage in taking ports within the designated area).

If we put it in terms of Naval Action and how we could play it. It would be like picking all the regions around La Tortue and La Navasse and giving 1 region to each other "active" nations. allowing for quick teleports and having all players know where to go to find PvP.

So for example

Sant Iago
PaP
Les Cayes
Cap Francios
Baracoa

Each region would be given to a different nation - not sure who would have what and that could be up for debate. But 5 regions given to 5 nations, Britain, US, Pirates, Denmark, France and boom, there you have your PvP all in the center of the map.

At least on first glance, I don't see a problem with this.

Edited August 11, 2017 by Teutonic

[Duncan McFail]

1 hour ago, Vllad said:

I could respect this if the fighting part actually occurred. 

We've had 2 pb's in your area and 1 pb in our area that you initiated. None of which you've shown up to. Port battles are actually pvp if you bother to show up that is.

[Duncan McFail]

3 minutes ago, Teutonic said:

Sant Iago
PaP
Les Cayes
Cap Francios
Baracoa

Nope. Pirates aren't giving up 5 ports right next to our capital for this idea. Make it away from capitals entirely. Nations don't need to be right next to the area. Just close enough to get there within 15 minutes. Look into the George Town area. Pirates, Brits, and French are already there. We'll givce the Danes Trinandad and Brits can give the US Pinar Del Rio.

[Dharus]

5 minutes ago, Duncan McFail said:

We've had 2 pb's in your area and 1 pb in our area that you initiated. None of which you've shown up to. Port battles are actually pvp if you bother to show up that is.

If you were preaching to a unified PB group with 25 players on all the time who have no life... sure.  But I'm not getting up at 2am EST or 5am EST for those two in France.

PBs can be fun sure but for RvR there are too many fundamental problems to base the map on them.  I suggested making raids like port battles (maybe with flags) and reward those fights.  Then make RvR some 3 day process of fighting on the open water.  This dock hump, off hour flip, screening either griefing or legit, alt use, hide in battle invis warp driving, etc business is just painful stupid.  There is no reason to play the RvR game.  We flip ports to produce OW pvp.  We did it with Brits just like we did with pirates.

[Vllad]

22 minutes ago, Duncan McFail said:

We've had 2 pb's in your area and 1 pb in our area that you initiated. None of which you've shown up to. Port battles are actually pvp if you bother to show up that is.

Re-read your post. It says. 

 

2 hours ago, Duncan McFail said:

Pirates get a group of 5th rates to kill your smaller group of 5ths and you kite them back to a free town, come out in bigger ships, and stomp them. We don't play by your rules and we don't fight on your terms. 

You weren't talking about PB's you were talking about open water. 

I stand by what I said. I could respect your thoughts but the Pirates never show up to PVP. 

[Bach]

14 minutes ago, Duncan McFail said:

Nope. Pirates aren't giving up 5 ports right next to our capital for this idea. Make it away from capitals entirely. Nations don't need to be right next to the area. Just close enough to get there within 15 minutes. Look into the George Town area. Pirates, Brits, and French are already there. We'll givce the Danes Trinandad and Brits can give the US Pinar Del Rio.

I feel it needs to be more than just a random pvp area. Needs to be something with RvR potential as well.  George Town isn't really good for all that. South America all along Maricabo maybe. What might be better is if we set up around Haiti and then we all contested for Haiti in RvR and PVP support it. With the land mass in the center there would be more moving dynamics than just converging in a center spot.  In that case probably Saint Iago, Ponce, San Juan and KPR.   If the idea is that the port isn't captured it doesn't matter if a home port is in the mix.

As I write this we're patrolling Mortimer Town now. So its not like giving up any of those ports around your home port are actually making a difference.  Loosen up a bit.

[Duncan McFail]

13 minutes ago, Dharus said:

But I'm not getting up at 2am EST or 5am EST for those two in France.

The last pb was before 10pm Eastern and the Cap Francois pb you flipped was near same time. If you worked on showing up to port battles as much as your excuses you'd actually have some territory.

5 minutes ago, Vllad said:

I stand by what I said. I could respect your thoughts but the Pirates never show up to PVP. 

You should read that last part that says port battles are actually pvp if you bother to show up. But I get it. You can't kite the opposition for hours in a pb or you just lose the port. You can't string out the opposition to pick them off more easily. You would actually have to defend circles. You would actually have to fight.

[Bach]

As much as I enjoy the back and forth banter and chest thumping the server is currently at 158 players when it used to be over 300. Its getting lower every week.   The banter isn't really progressing towards fixing anything. You cant force players to RvR any more than you can force them to PvP if they really don't want to.  Those aren't solutions.

[Duncan McFail]

3 minutes ago, Bach said:

I feel it needs to be more than just a random pvp area. Needs to be something with RvR potential as well.  George Town isn't really good for all that. South America all along Maricabo maybe. What might be better is if we set up around Haiti and then we all contested for Haiti in RvR and PVP support it. With the land mass in the center there would be more moving dynamics than just converging in a center spot.  In that case probably Saint Iago, Ponce, San Juan and KPR.   If the idea is that the port isn't captured it doesn't matter if a home port is in the mix.

As I write this we're patrolling Mortimer Town now. So its not like giving up any of those ports around your home port are actually making a difference.  Loosen up a bit.

Makes a huge difference. You put a pvp hotspot near a capital and it turns into forced pvp instead of willing pvp. The whole idea behind the original fight club on pvp2 was to get the people who wanted to fight in one area. Put it near the capital and suddenly every noob that trys to make a trade run near that area is being ganked. And we're not giving up any territory near our capital. If you want to come hunt at Mort you have to take the long trip and be far away from restocking. 

[Bach]

15 minutes ago, Duncan McFail said:

Makes a huge difference. You put a pvp hotspot near a capital and it turns into forced pvp instead of willing pvp. The whole idea behind the original fight club on pvp2 was to get the people who wanted to fight in one area. Put it near the capital and suddenly every noob that trys to make a trade run near that area is being ganked. And we're not giving up any territory near our capital. If you want to come hunt at Mort you have to take the long trip and be far away from restocking. 

You have a point on the noobs hauling and mission running. So perhaps South America will work better. But as far as "the long trip" its really not the case. The free ports are already well stocked with supplies and I have 8 of them as out posts. No one actually sails long distance. You sail a BCutter half way and since you don't own any ports in between you just attack an NPC then surrender and it teleports you to the next free town in the path. Rinse and repeat and you can cross the map in half the time as long as you don't own ports in between. 

I could write a small guide on living out of free ports. But that is for another time.  We need to get the fun back into our server.

Edited August 11, 2017 by Bach

[JobaSet]

4 minutes ago, Bach said:

You have a point on the noobs hauling and mission running. So perhaps South America will work better. But as far as "the long trip" its really not the case. The free ports are already well stocked with supplies and I have 8 of them as out posts. No one actually sails long distance. You sail a BCutter half way and since you don't own any ports in between you just attack an NPC then surrender and it teleports you to the next free town in the path. Rinse and repeat and you can cross the map in half the time as long as you don't own ports in between. 

I could write a small guide on living out of free ports. But that is for another time.  We need to get the fun back into our server.

exploit lol just kidding we all do it..... 

[Rhodry Heidenrich]

2 hours ago, Duncan McFail said:

. We don't play by your rules and we don't fight on your terms. 

Hombre,

This is good, as you do what you do. On the flip side, I think you know that nobody else necessarily wants to play by  your rules or on your terms. Warfare at its core. 

Also, yeah port battles are PvP.. Only when other people show up to actually engage in them. Otherwise they're a really boring cycle of grinding NPC fleets for hostility, then capturing empty circles while shooting each other's sails. "Good job everybody, we fought the enemy and he was us." 

When was the last time BLACK got a good, exciting, "this could go either way", nail biting, action packed, this is better than sex, Admiral Nelson's corpse just got a boner, 1st rate broadsiding boogaloo PB? I know the last time I was involved in something like that was Port Antonio last year, and I was just in a piddly little 3rd rate. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Barbancourt]

43 minutes ago, Duncan McFail said:

The last pb was before 10pm Eastern and the Cap Francois pb you flipped was near same time. If you worked on showing up to port battles as much as your excuses you'd actually have some territory.

Which would promptly be lost in 4 days, necessitating yet another PVE fleet grind to set another PB, ad nauseum.  Nobody wants to do the serial port flipping anymore.