Hotfix for patch 13 - Important port battle rule changes

[George Washington]

3 hours ago, Eleven said:

As a draw is a win for the defender, this system will bias defenders a lot 

Attacking means accepting the challenge in front of you. Do you think historically battles were balanced and s*it? Defenders do have upper hand in any battle. They sit and wait for you to come. Read The Art of War book. Attacker will always suffer greater loses during the first initial attack push. 

This means you always put tanked ships in front when charging and rotate them as line moves forward. Front Damaged fall back/repair - 2nd take the lead. Repeat. This creates unstoppable spear head. 

Edited November 3, 2017 by George Washington

[admin]

5 hours ago, Intrepido said:

 

Please devs, a BR and stats rebalance is badly needed to reach the FULL potential of this feature.

yes we indicated that in one of the next hot fixes we will address some stat rebalancing (including wasa) + ship BRs

[George Washington]

12 minutes ago, admin said:

yes we indicated that in one of the next hot fixes we will address some stat rebalancing (including wasa) + ship BRs

...opens last bottle of old aged Whiskey. RIP Wasa... may you find peace with other 3rd rates. May light shine again on these old good driftwoods: Agamemnon (aka Shorty), Ingermanland (aka Old Russian), Constitution (aka Balls of Steel), Wapen (aka Cherry Poppin).

Edited November 3, 2017 by George Washington

[Teutonic]

Awesome to hear, i will stop bickering about it and just wait patiently for the BR update.

[fox2run]

Fantastic to hear that another port battle patch has been launced for the small bunch of elite-guys who still play the game.

What about playability for the average, common, casual player? 

 

[Hethwill]

4 minutes ago, fox2run said:

What about playability for the average, common, casual player? 

I suppose we are talking about Port Battles playability for the average, common and casual players, given it is the main motif of the thread.

With that in mind;

Captain, can you please explain better what you mean ?

Many thanks.

 

[Lz3]

Suggestion: Right now it seems that the BR system is based off historical values. Why not base it off activity and tax? I have a feeling this would need to be tuned a bit, but it would certainly add more to gameplay when a clans most important $ generating port gets a larger potential fleet as it is off more importance. However there would have to be caps on both ends to not make battles too small or too big

[Farrago]

12 hours ago, admin said:

 

• IMPORTANT CHANGE: Victory conditions/points for captured zones

  • Every port battle has 3 zones (objectives) that accumulate points if captured (as before)
  • Zones are still captured by the side that has more ships in the zone (as before)
  • But the captured zone points don't accumulate if even a single ENEMY ship is present in the objective (NEW FEATURE)

Perhaps I am missing some nuance but basically #2 doesn’t matter because of #3.

It would be more accurate to say:

“Your nation can only accumulate capture points from a circle if you are the only nation with a ship (or ships) in a circle.”

[Christendom]

A little personal feedback for @admin

Successfully defended a port tonight on Global, Georgetown with not even max BR vs a full BR 1st rate and assorted fleet.  Unfortunately my recording screwed up and I wasn't able to save the battle.  

We brought in a little beef, some wasa's and a couple fast ships to hold and deny circles.  We straight up slapped together this group with some random joiners, alts and whatever we could teleport in that would fit with the BR.

We pulled the ole Swede kite maneuver.  Brought the 1st rates who were trying to brawl downwind to where they were not threat to us and then sunk  their top group they were using for mortar brig protection.  My only regret is we didn't let them have the bottom circle soon enough, we would of been able to sink 2 more.  This PB was uninteresting and the only challenge we had was getting there on time and avoiding their 10 person 1st rate gank fleet outside.

The new BR PBs and the new circle ship deny mechanic make defending ports absurdly easy.  While I believe that it should be harder to attack then defend, it's overwhelming slated to the defenders.  Needs to be adjusted.  While I'm a proponent of the BR system for PBs, I'm not exactly sure that 100% BR is the way to go.  Maybe bring back a hybrid of the old system and BR?  Or maybe have a PB be a randomized comp of ships that only appears after the PB is set?

 

Bonus after the battle.  @King of Crowns died for country and his buddy made a worthy donation to my ship garage.

Edited November 4, 2017 by Christendom

[Quineloe]

6th rates can't enter deep water ports.

[Vernon Merrill]

*Cough* *Cough*  Variable wind in battle instances....    *Cough* *Cough*

[Celtiberofrog]

  

9 hours ago, Batman said:

I kept two spanish Wasa's busy at B (South side) until I got support from two incoming british wasa's

Well played all.

The new mechanic for the circles is quite a change, indeed, a defending Hermion can happily manouver inside & outside circle, and keep the point count off for a very long while unless enemy brings enough ships to remove it from the zone. Which means that the attacker reduce its offensive fleet so to capture one circle. Do the same for 3 circles and defender can outnumber attacker in fighting zones. 

So in small scale Deep water PB's, where ship numbers are very limited, the choice & entering position of ships is becoming absolutely crucial.

The ongoing testing will tell, but it looks like this new feature increases the attacker difficulty.

[King of Crowns]

if kiting is the issue now and outnumbering people in circles. how about this wonderful idea..... 1 circle. same size as currently. no more deny option and no more problem of being outnumbered in 2 circles. the whole point of the circles is to force the engagement. makes sense if you want to defend your port than defend this circle. if you want to run around and not fight... you loose your port. sometimes the simple solution is the best. the need for fast ships will still be there in order to catch mortar brigs and hurt ships. 

Edited November 8, 2017 by King of Crowns

[Corona Lisa]

1 minute ago, King of Crowns said:

if kiting is the issue now and outnumbering people in circles. how about this wonderful idea..... 1 circle. same size as currently. no more deny option and no more problem of being outnumbered in 2 circles. the whole point of the circles is to force the engagement. makes sense if you want to defend your port than defend this circle. if you want to run around and not fight... you loose your port. sometimes the simple solution is the best. the need for fast ships will still be there in order to catch mortar brings and hurt ships. 

1 Circle for smaller ports (max 4800BR) and 3 circles for higher BR ports would be nice

[Wolfram Harms]

7 hours ago, rediii said:

Frigates are useless in current PBs sadly

Not only Frigates - we see no big variety of ships anymore in NAVAL ACTION.
Neither in PortBattles, nor in the Open World.

Everyone is running around in the same few ships - which is a pity, with all the ships we have.

As for PBs, maybe 3 - 5 types of PortBattle sets could be fixed, with certain numbers of each ship?

For example "Port Battle Type II" (Just an example)
Three 6th-Rates
Seven 5th-Rates
Six 4th-Rates
Four 3rd-Rates
Three 2nd-Rates
Two 1st-Rate

Just an example of such a PB ships set, with 25 players in battle. Other weightings of ships, like "Shallow Sets" would be possible.

 

[King of Crowns]

13 hours ago, Wolfram Harms said:

Not only Frigates - we see no big variety of ships anymore in NAVAL ACTION.
Neither in PortBattles, nor in the Open World.

Everyone is running around in the same few ships - which is a pity, with all the ships we have.

As for PBs, maybe 3 - 5 types of PortBattle sets could be fixed, with certain numbers of each ship?

For example "Port Battle Type II" (Just an example)
Three 6th-Rates
Seven 5th-Rates
Six 4th-Rates
Four 3rd-Rates
Three 2nd-Rates
Two 1st-Rate

Just an example of such a PB ships set, with 25 players in battle. Other weightings of ships, like "Shallow Sets" would be possible.

 

totally against this because it goes back to requiring 25 ships for a port battle. eliminating the ability of small clans to play the game. 

[Landsman]

32 minutes ago, King of Crowns said:

totally against this because it goes back to requiring 25 ships for a port battle. eliminating the ability of small clans to play the game. 

Not really surprised since he is a swergling. They are probably the only nation that doesn't have a problem with RvR player numbers and they don't exactly try to keep it a secret either, that they don't give a hello kitty about the other nations / small clans' struggle...

[Landsman]

7 hours ago, Intrepido said:

Ports can be successfully defended with less people now. 18-20 guys can.

What about screening fleets?

[Landsman]

12 hours ago, Intrepido said:

Ports can be successfully defended with less people now. 18-20 guys can.

 

5 hours ago, Intrepido said:

bring more players

[Landsman]

1 hour ago, Intrepido said:

To attack a port and be sure to will enter it, bring a screening fleet with you.

So basically numbers still matter. You can only defend but not attack without numbers, meaning you can only lose but not take ports. As long as screening fleets are a thing and RvR isn't only played in lobby, numbers will always matter. Also you actually failed to apply the meme correctly. You use that gif at the end obviously... ?  How would you close the keyboard but keep typing?  

[Tiedemann]

On 11/3/2017 at 11:07 AM, admin said:

 

IMPORTANT CHANGE: Victory conditions/points for captured zones

• But the captured zone points don't accumulate if even a single ENEMY ship is present in the objective (NEW FEATURE)

Imo this made it possible to win pbs by avoiding combat/kiting (again). Defender can have some small fast ships (ex. Prince) to go in and out of the circles, denying the attacker points or just slowing down the attackers point increase enough for it never to reach 1000. Does not mater if attackers dedicate the highest BR to capture the circles when the defender has fast ships that just are kiting while sailing in and out of the circle at different entering points. Result is that attacker do not gain enough points to win, even if the attacker destroy the most ships and have the most points.

IMO kiting/running away should never be a valid tactic for defending a port. I thought the main reason for the circles was to avoid kiting victory's.  

Suggestion: Reverse "the captured zone points don't accumulate if even a single ENEMY ship is present in the objective" back the the highest BR in circle gives points. Also change the victory condition to the the team with the most points at the end of the battle wins the PB. This would force attackers and defenders to capture the circles and invest BR in holding them. Then letting the attackers destroy the Tower and Forts would be a disaster for defenders, in sted of an minor inconvenience as it is now..