Little things you'd like to see

[maturin]

The thing about studdingsails is that they are goddamn complicated. Their chapter in Seamanship in the Age of Sail is like five times longer than all the other chapters.

 

I don't think it's really worth it if they're just going to be a speed-boost where we set all the canvas willy-nilly, with no regards to any of the real factors at work.

 

Paintings of ships with every studding sail set are due either to artistic license or a flat calm where the captain wants to take maximum advantage of ANY puff of air from a butterfly ruffling its wings in China.

 

In practice, the most common use of studdingsails would be set them on one side of the ship only. And most of the time you would only use one or two: a foretopsail stun'sail on the windward side, maybe a maintopsail stun'sail on the leeward side (before stun'sails were mostly discontinued on the mainmast).

 

Basically you would need to allow a huge variety of configurations, including weird stuff like stun'sails on the maintopgallant but not the topsail, making the higher sail wider.

[RMS Gigantic]

I think, somewhere, the devs said they think stunsails make the ships look fat. I think they make the ships look studly.

Indeed, I like the imposing look they give. I would compare it to a lizard opening up its flaps when it scares away predators.

[Johny Reb]

I'd like to see gun signals as a means of identifying friendly ships. Maybe this is something that can be player controlled. In weather there is a fog that obscures ships at longer ranges. If we set up a gun signal such as firing three ranging shots we could identify friend and foe.

[Caswyn StGeorge]

As Johny Reb mentioned the guns signals it just came into mind:
 

Greeting a port or another ship with a salute from the guns 3/5/7 shots

 

http://www.marinelink.com/news/constitution-salute-fires355353.aspx

 

http://www.pinterest.com/pin/317081629984219353/

[SerrialKiller]

Guns we not sure yet. You can change gun types on each deck and will be able to pick the number of guns on it. But inside that deck they will need to be similar (technology and ui limitations).

 

Naval Powers

here is a sneak peek into our national plans - these are not all of them - but well keep it for future posts.

 

In addition to flags we will have an extensive system of authentic banners and ensigns that can show many things to your friends or enemies.

some examples (all are hand drawn by artists)

 

Gosh we need to update the website!

 

Well i am still missing an loth of things in the whole setup specially the dutch people and flags ships and manny more one of the most rich powers from those times.

[Capt. Harry Flashman]

Realistic wind modelling and its effects on the ships. I want to see ships "locked in irons" when they do a poor manouver and end up facing the wind.

[maturin]

Already in the game, fenthedog.

[PIerrick de Badas]

Already in the game, fenthedog.

+1 in pvp my ennemy fail to track and never finish the move. I sunk it after 10 minutes with him crying

[maturin]

Haha, did you give him any advice on how to get out of the bind?

[Mirones]

why should he? its not like there is an full sticky threaded with information for it from pictures to full video tutorials

[Feretier]

why should he? its not like there is an full sticky threaded with information for it from pictures to full video tutorials

 

Not to mention that giving informations to your enemy is considered high treason

[Mirones]

,,everything you say can and will be used against you,,  <3

[Capt. Harry Flashman]

Im not a tester so i could be mistaken but viewing the utube vids it appears the raising and lowering the sails appears far to fast. Changing the sails is a labour intensive job and I think if the time taken could be reflected by the quality of the crew. This could add an extra dimension in the tactical decisions made during a battle?

[maturin]

The furling and unfurling is of course too fast.  But if they would change the animation to represent the sails being clewed up, then it would be much more natural-looking, as that is a fairly fast operation that requires no men on the yards.

[b.westall]

State origins for the regiments.

ie 5th Ohio

[Otakar]

I want my captain to be a yelling s.o.b chewing out his crew with witty yet mildly insulting remarks with a lot of curse words... like a real captain would xD

[Privateer]

On the subject of large ships, though this may not be the most appropriate of places, I would be interested in seeing the overall difficulty of operation scaling with size.  While this may be intrinsic to existing mechanics, a viable method of limiting the effectiveness of men o'war, I suspect, may be in requiring extensive knowledge, preparation, and attention to detail during their operation.  Perhaps a sloop or schooner is far more forgiving in most conditions, and requires less multitasking to use effectively.  Conversely, a first rate is an incredibly expensive monster that requires a very large, well-trained crew to function, and is much more susceptible to environmental hazards such as shallows, gunports coming awash, and strong headwind during tack.  The crew's responsiveness to commands may be considerably slower for large ships, especially in the heat of battle, which may become a compounding issue when casualties mount.

 

Citing EVE and PotBS as prime examples, the scale of the vessel does not adequately (in my experience) dictate the amount of skill required to use it effectively.  I find that EVE's titans and dreadnoughts—roughly equivalent to ships-of-the-line in their respective environments—certainly require a lot of preparatory commitment from their operators, and necessitate a great deal of strategic coordination leading up to the battle, but in the heat of battle itself are not particularly demanding.  The pilot can rely on their character "skills" and the quality of their outfitting, as well as the tremendous effort of their entire team, to see them through battle safely.  There is, by contrast, negligible emphasis on the pilot's own intuition; FC calls targets, spam F1 through 8, wait til the thing dies or moves out of range.  Smaller ships have the luxury of keeping the thing in range more easily, but are otherwise ostensibly the same.  Small skirmishes are a different matter, though capital ships and small skirmishes rarely coalesce, thus the comparison is moot.

 

PotBS (again, in my experience) seems to tell a similar story.  Ships-of-the-line demand different tactics than their smaller, nimbler counterparts in an asymmetrical skirmish environment, but on the symmetrical fleet level the difference appears manifest only in tempo.  When everyone is sailing first and second rates in a port battle, it's essentially a frigate battle but at a slower pace.  The alternative invariably devolves into bouts of "stern camping," which I find equally dissatisfying.

 

Granted, I'm not the most skilled or knowledgeable player on either front, but I do speak from several years of experience.  Does any of that make sense?

 

I suppose the crux of the issue is EVE and PotBS lack the grandeur associated with capital ships.  They feel like larger and slower versions of everything else, but little more.  They aren't particularly difficult to use, and tend to have very high intrinsic survivability by virtue of numbers, rather than commander skill, alone.

[Barberouge]

I like the idea of increasing the crew move durations for larger ships, creating a need for more anticipation. Maybe other management difficulties could be found out. PotBS' adage was: "scout ship: easy to learn, difficult to master - warship: difficult to learn, easy to master". In fact, both had a steep learning curve, for ship management as well as for group maneuvers. I don't think that the frigate/lineship difference can be explained with "slower pace", because the stats aren't all changed with the same modifier. For example, some frigates could change side to shoot more often, as lineships should keep reloading on the same side. Same goes with the armor/damage/accuracy/penetration ratios.

 

I've never been a lineship player, but I know that what you call "negligible emphasis on the pilot's own intuition" is exactly what could make a port battle won or lost, apart from tactics, discipline and communication - but of course the latters were often more important. Also we should differentiate between periods in PotBS. Especially, the speed of the different lineships was important, because having a faster line was an advantage. Some maps were sometimes well fitted to 1st rates, some were less. Also there was often a frigate group in port battles, and given the fragility and the power of those ships, there was more complexity than "bouts of stern camping". PotBS biggest problem regarding port battles was that we could rarely have two good fleets, thus the "pilots intuitions" weren't the key. Differences of use existed between ship types though.

 

But I agree that managing a lineship could be more complex than a frigate, in addition to the inherent little forgiveness, and epicness of those ships.

[Privateer]

I agree that it's not as straightforward as I made it out to be.  I should have been more clear in my explanation regarding PotBS: it would seem that stern camping is the dominant skirmish doctrine against lineships in a small (especially 1v1) environment, barring intervention by other ships that may thwart one's attempt to camp.  In fleet action stern camping isn't particularly reliable (you may get some excellent raking broadsides in during a fleet melee, or when the opposing line comes about), but for the most part, in my experience, a line battle consists of a lengthy exchange of broadsides until one of the lines exhibits major weakness, and/or when both fleets have closed in to the point where breaking the line is inevitable.

 

You raise an excellent point concerning frigates.  In many circumstances an agile frigate can bring both broadsides to bear in the time it takes a lineship to reload once, which not only improves the frigate's effective firepower but its survivability as well, even in a strictly broadside-vs-broadside encounter.  My points regarding "negligible emphasis on the pilot's own intuition" are primarily with respect to EVE's fleet combat mechanics, in which the type of ship and its outfitting play a greater role than the pilot's ability to use that ship.  For example, a frigate pilot can still be a formidable opponent in a battleship despite possessing little experience with that class of ship, if they have good character skills, a solid fitting, and can follow instructions.  This is not the case in small-scale skirmish environments (such as 1v1), in which the player's tactical acumen has a more dominant role in dictating their survival. 

 

I believe that in a real-world setting, there would be much more emphasis on the pilot's ability to use the ship than the game chooses to acknowledge.  A frigate pilot may be used to a small, tight-knit, specialized crew and a broad range of responsibilities, as well as quick feedback from a small and maneuverable vessel.  Placing this pilot in a battleship environment would demand the cooperation of hundreds of men and officers, through which orders would flow much more slowly and feedback would be equally delayed.  The pilot, incapable of being everywhere at once (figuratively), would have a far less intimate relationship with his ship and company, relying more on the reports and discipline of others to conduct routine, much less combat, operations.  When the smoke fogs his view, the splinters scatter his crew, and the incessent rolling of gunfire (all of which are much more pronounced on a large ship) add additional layers of difficulty to all of this, simply following the instructions of the fleet commander as if he were aboard a frigate would require a lot more work than that with which he is familiar.

 

I hope that better explains my position on the matter.  (Does it?)

[Barberouge]

Stern or bow camping was one of the main frigate port battle tactics when I left PotBS. Also the battle lines often turned because of the coast or not, and this created the situation where knowing your ship was important.

 

As for ship types, the game already features (lots of) smoke, and temporary penalties due to gun fire have been talked about. Delays may be interesting.

 

Also BTW, what about letting an admiral choosing a flagship and not having to manage that ship ? As it was in reality.

[BrutishVulgarian]

I would like to see a cross marketing agreement with the Surgeon Simulator folks. If you buy, Surgeon Simulator 1814, you get a free copy of Naval Action and visa versa.

Georgian era surgery on rolling ship would be a guaranteed hit for the surgery simulator people and having to remove giant splinters in the heat of battle, to save your crew, would elevate the drama of Naval Action.

[Mirones]

@ Brutish

 

more Sand!

[Leviathan]

I would like the ability to choose the looks of my crew from a preset group of options that are perhaps specific to a certain nation or faction. I'd hate to turn pirate but be forced to sail the seas with scallywags dressed in sweater vests and khakis

[Barberouge]

If the game is to feature avatars one day, running around with a saw and a barrel of rum would be funny for sure. Then a captain would choose between rum for morale or rum for surgery. If we could get more realistic workshops, cooking could be interesting - meat has to be properly cooked, water mixed with vinegar and hardtack dunked in brine. Launching knifes on rats in the bilge would make for a nice hobby. During battles, launching grappling hooks or turning a grapeshot-loaded carronade to the quarterdecks could punctuate the boardings. Not sure about the pumping workshop though.

[Capt Schroder]

would like Whaling