Little things you'd like to see

[Mirones]

i think we can allready fire a single shot to see if the aiming is correct and let the rest of the gundecks follow look on the video footage there you can see it.

 

i like to see shipwrecks of an old spanish galeon on an island and stuff little details in the envirorment

[BrutishVulgarian]

If doesn't hurt frame rates, someday it would be nice to see flotsam debris and swimmers around sinking ships.

[maturin]

Speaking of flotsam, fallen masts should float around and cause serious flooding if struck at speed.

[Lurken]

i have some more ideas for consideration:

 

if two ships gets too close, you have a chance to get entangled riggings, for example if one is turning and your mast hit the other ships mast, and then a chance to topbrake the mast, also the ability to ram your opponent, doing damage depending on armor, structure and speed.

 

another idea is the ability to level your guns to shoot either hull or masts, and having a timer for when the cannons are leveled enough to shoot the masts, unless it is too close and the guns cannot be leveled enough =)

[dutchdouche]

gotta love the West india Company:D

[akd]

Think about the consequences for normal gameplay, though.

If it is possible to knock down a mast or spar with a single shot from a chaser, we can expect a full broadside or two to wreck the rigging completely. I doubt that the devs will relish the idea of every battle ending up with unmanageable hulks on each side.

Well, probability of such hits should be very low, i.e. critical locations should be hard to hit and should have a chance modifier applied to the outcome. Plus there should be more opportunity for careful aim with chasers versus firing full broadsides, i.e. there should probably be cannon dispersion (and possibly sea state dispersion if devs chose to go with a "stabilized" firing platform that ignores pitch and roll) applied to careful aimed fire with chasers, and cannon + crew dispersion applied to firing broadsides. Furthermore, many such lucky shots could be reparable in a reasonably short period of time.

If all chasers have is a chance to do 1% of the damage of a broadside, then they would be useless weight and players would be robbed of one of the essential elements of the thrill of the case. Imagine if chase scenarios were nothing more than firing a chaser 40 times with no chance of doing anything more than achieving the same incremental damage effects of a single broadside.

[maturin]

Realistically, though, that's pretty much the case. Ships ended up dismasted in combat much more often than they do in-game, because masts are so sturdy and there is no progressive degradation of standing rigging. And chasers were used in chases that could be days-long, banging away and missing as often as not. 100 random shots to the rigging will always be more effective than 1 aimed shot, with a black powder cannon.

 

So chasers will only work if there is a more detailed damage model, conceivably one that is only enabled for their shot. Temporary damage is where it's at, as you said. Cutting braces to prevent yard rotation, cutting sheets to halve the power of a given sail, damaging the parrel or chains of a yard to render that sail useless... these are all things that should be freely reparable without expending resources, over the course of five minutes or so.

[Johny Reb]

Sounds good Maturin but the 5 minutes to repair the rigging seems a little harsh to me for a game all in all. I would cut that time in half at least.

[Alex Connor]

The hull damage model is complex and works well, I trust the rigging damage model will catch up to it.

 

Rigging divided into masts, spars, standing and running rigging. Masts are strong, likely to take multiple hits to bring down. Spars less so, one or two hits might well break a spar, although the lower spars are still quite tough. Standing rigging supports the masts, although individual shrouds are easily cut you'd have to cut a lot of them to fell the mast. Running rigging, easily severed and like maturin says damage to this can disable associated rigging until repaired, but won't cause lasting damage.

 

Under normal circumstances in a fight, maneuvering under topsails only and at low speeds it would take a considerable amount of damage to bring down anything important. However, in a chase ships will be running at high speeds, masts and sails under strain. Here, a single shot might cause failure. Although it is still very unlikely for this shot to bring down a whole mast, hitting a topmast, or severing its shrouds down one side (from chase angles these shrouds are nicely lined up to be cut with one shot) could well result in its loss. Same for sails, normally one hit won't do much but under strain it might cause the whole sail to blow out and tear itself to shreds.

[maturin]

Maybe, but the idea of temporary damage to running rigging is that it only robs you of a few knots, giving the enemy a chance to catch up. It's not full incapacitation.

[Alex Connor]

Temporary damage would be much more likely, after all even to hit the topmast you are aiming at a moving 15in or so target at several hundred meters with a smoothbore cannon...

 

And losing a topmast isn't totally incapacitating, just a penalty you'd have to stop to fix. Might decide a chase, but it would be rare and the result of either fantastic aiming or an element of luck, probably both.

[Chilly Willy]

would love to the ability to send messages by using signal flags.

to be able to change cannon types and sizes

to re-fit a boat that normally does not have bow chasers to be able to

may be a bit difficult to do but would love to see my opponent explode in a ball of fire if i happened to hit his powder magazine   P.S. maybe 1 in 200

to have the ability of Shore guns to fire HEATED shot

to see fire on ships / sails

[Mirones]

 

would love to the ability to send messages by using signal flags. statement by admin not most likely to happen because the casual player wont be able to understand them

to be able to change cannon types and sizes was confirmed from the very begining 

to re-fit a boat that normally does not have bow chasers to be able to could be a nice sugestion 

may be a bit difficult to do but would love to see my opponent explode in a ball of fire if i happened to hit his powder magazine    it happened yes but not because of a hit on the powermagazin since it is located allways below the water line the swedish 140gun Krona capsized and the loose lamps or fuse ignited the magazine riping her apart. but its not the action game like potbs where evry single ship explodes if you sink it

to have the ability of Shore guns to fire HEATED shot  wasnt sugested yet if i recall it right

to see fire on ships / sails might come or will come for sure

 

o7

[Chilly Willy]

would love to the ability to send messages by using signal flags. statement by admin not most likely to happen because the casual player wont be able to understand them

 

Maybe signal flags could be a semi-perm item to denote the captain's name or society name; A pay item perhaps?

Also would like to be able to see the name of ones boat on the Fantail; also a semi-perm item, Another pay item?

as i would pay to put both on my ship.

[Матроскин]

I'd like to see a system where each group or squadron could assign a leader, and the leader would have extra abilities used for helping organize the attack, for example, a marker to identify the target. There could a chain of command as well, in case the leader is killed.

 

A marker would solve the problem of Cyrillic player/ship names, by the way.

 

Just as an aside, it seems like lots of people seem to be using PotBS as a frame of reference, almost to the point of treating Naval Action like "PotBS II". Personally, and I have nothing against PotBS (I played for years), I hope the devs are starting from a clean sheet.

[PegasusUK]

I hope the devs are starting from a clean sheet.

 

From reading the threads from the devs I believe that is their intention.

[Матроскин]

From reading the threads from the devs I believe that is their intention.

 

Good to hear!

[classiccatZ]

What I would like to see is if you want realism is. If you have port battles and the players go into the fort or city ,then they  can shoot with cannons at the invading ships .Level of the fort is decided by its  development, either the fort or ships can be destroyed . Then they can move in or move on to  try and win the battle as per the challenges put in by the game. The guns of the fort are activated by the players in the fort and can be killed by the ships attacking the fort also going into the city can have different challenges.

[Chilly Willy]

What I would like to see is if you want realism is. If you have port battles and the players go into the fort or city ,then they  can shoot with cannons at the invading ships .Level of the fort is decided by its  development, either the fort or ships can be destroyed . Then they can move in or move on to  try and win the battle as per the challenges put in by the game. The guns of the fort are activated by the players in the fort and can be killed by the ships attacking the fort also going into the city can have different challenges.

That would be cool to use the forts guns to defend it

  

[Mirones]

pah using cannons against ships give me an Musket!

[Hawke]

It's certainly a little gimmick, but I would like to be able to salute other players. Perhaps you could load your cannons with a "saluting" powder charge, then repeatedly tap spacebar to fire off the individual guns.

[maturin]

That's already quite possible with ranging shots, with all sorts of nuances and protocols. Number of guns, leeward vs windward, etc.

[Hawke]

Indeed, however you wouldn't want to send a ball crashing through someone by mistake. 

 

Or maybe....

[Månis]

o7

 

 

Speaking of Kronan.  Do we need to worry about flooding the decks if we do sharp turns in high winds with open gunports? Can ships actually take on water without beeing inflected by cannondamage?

 

edit 

I would like a  system like Potbs where you can upload custom flags and sails. 

[Mirones]

well if you took some water and are close to the water line with gunports and you giv to much sail you will take another big load and end up to low and start sinking without chance of recovery