Boarding advisory 2/2/2018

[admin]

Boarding advisory 2/2/2018

Captains

Number of marines books have increased and if you are unprepared you might lose your ship in melee combat because marines are very well trained in attack. (basically you can now equip 2 marine books or 1 depending on options increasing number of marines up to 30% on frigates for example)

It will be adjusted soon, but before that please equip marines yourself if you are sailing through hostile waters. And improve your defensive capacity by equipping barricades.

Keep your ship speed above 4 knots at all times and if you hearing boarding whistles switch to grape (crew damage is increased if your enemy is on the boarding focus.

[z4ys]

Out of the Rover Handbook - Topic:  Safe voyages

 

Tacking ist the most vulnerable maneuver to boarding. If you are not sure if your enemy is boarding pre. better perform wearing instead of tacking.

 

In case you get boarded:

Normally its easy to see when a ship closes in for a boarding. Thats the time you should get your own boarding parties ready if you cant advoid the attack.

Boarding Axes might help as well to cut the ropes faster.

Otherwise disengage as soon as possible  around 70 prep are good. Play defend early that forces your enemy to use costly last second attackes.

Edited February 2, 2018 by z4ys

[Bristol Fashion]

@admin

Will we see a decrease in the current (excessive) range that ships are able to pull one another into boarding?

I think this is especially important with the latest reduction to all ship speeds (which was a good thing imo).

Edited February 2, 2018 by Bristol Fashion

[Guest]

I approve of this change. Boarding in this demasting meta is going to be huge. 

[Cecil Selous]

I disapprove.

[Odol]

Just now, Banished Privateer said:

I don't get why we don't have a slider to choose how many Marines we want. If I want 5 marines or 20 or 200... We are forced to 5% or 10% which make a huge difference depending on the ship size. Give freedom to adjust marines count.

This... so much this.

[Cmdr RideZ]

I understood meta was to shoot masts and board.

You made mast weaker and boarding stronger.

I am not smart enough to understand why devs do stuff like this.

...

@TommyShelby Maybe you can help me out here?  Why devs made the current meta even stronger?  Why exactly the current meta?  Tell me there is nothing weird in this?  Was there a conversation at testing forum about this?  Why would devs do something like this?

Edited February 2, 2018 by Cmdr RideZ

[blubasso]

57 minutes ago, Banished Privateer said:

I don't get why we don't have a slider to choose how many Marines we want. If I want 5 marines or 20 or 200... We are forced to 5% or 10% which make a huge difference depending on the ship size. Give freedom to adjust marines count.

Wells, take my explanation just as what it really is: just an opinion and not a truth in the bronze sculpted: because marines are "more" and could not exceed the max number of people that a given ship can carry and stay full operative. A ship needs sailors most of all, and then "guests". So i think that the percentage and nor a slider is more appropriate.

IMO.

Edited February 2, 2018 by blubasso

[Cecil Selous]

25 minutes ago, Banished Privateer said:

I don't get why we don't have a slider to choose how many Marines we want. If I want 5 marines or 20 or 200... We are forced to 5% or 10% which make a huge difference depending on the ship size. Give freedom to adjust marines count.

 

24 minutes ago, Odol said:

This... so much this.

Absolutely not. Then we are back to floating barracks, which we already had with the gold marines upgrade. Where you basically have no chance if it comes to boarding and your opponent has 50% marines or some other fantasy complement and is max boarding fitted. The time when frigates and 4th rates boarding 1st rates. And now don't come with some wise comments, like: It is your fault if it comes to boarding, it is your fault if you can't defeat an enemy who has less crew for other tasks, yada yada yada. Nice to say if he has a friend who is demobilizing you, so that he can easily push your ship (another stupid thing). It's a horror for solo players, who aren't Liq, Ram Dinark or all the pvp gods  If you aren't boarding fitted too, you have absolutely no chance to win a boarding action.

[Odol]

2 minutes ago, Cecil Selous said:

 

Absolutely not. Then we are back to floating barracks, which we already had with the gold marines upgrade. Where you basically have no chance if it comes to boarding and your opponent has 50% marines or some other fantasy complement and is max boarding fitted. The time when frigates and 4th rates boarding 1st rates. And now don't come with some wise comments, like: It is your fault if it comes to boarding, it is your fault if you can't defeat an enemy who has less crew for other tasks, yada yada yada. Nice to say if he has a friend who is demobilizing you, so that he can easily push your ship (another stupid thing). It's a horror for solo players, who aren't Liq, Ram Dinark or all the pvp gods  If you aren't boarding fitted too, you have absolutely no chance to win a boarding action.

If you want to sail around in a Constitution with 300 marines and 150 sailors well.. you aint loading guns, you would be lucky to get your sails up anytime today and your ship would handle even slower. 

But the slider would/should have a maximum amount for marines, say 1-20% crew.  This would be a realistic number. 

[maturin]

1 hour ago, Bristol Fashion said:

@admin

Will we see a decrease in the current (excessive) range that ships are able to pull one another into boarding?

Would be nice, but people usually ram for boarding anyways (this is realistic).

[Sir Texas Sir]

1 hour ago, Banished Privateer said:

I don't get why we don't have a slider to choose how many Marines we want. If I want 5 marines or 20 or 200... We are forced to 5% or 10% which make a huge difference depending on the ship size. Give freedom to adjust marines count.

Isn't this exactly what we are getting.  You can pick how many marines by stacking the slots. If you want more marines it will cost you two slots. You can get up to 30% more mairnes. Folks remember they added some more marine options too.  1-3 rates now have the option of 10% or 20%.  Which stacks to 30%. 

Edited February 2, 2018 by Sir Texas Sir

[Barbancourt]

How boarding works is a big mystery area of the game, aside from the rock-paper-scissors chart.  I'm not terribly excited about playing Naval Rock-Paper-Scissors in the first place.

[blubasso]

8 minutes ago, Sir Texas Sir said:

Isn't this exactly what we are getting.  You can pick how many marines by stacking the slots. If you want more marines it will cost you two slots. You can get up to 30% more mairnes. Folks remember they added some more marine options too.  1-3 rds now have the option of 10% or 20%.  Which stacks to 30%. 

Sorry, 30% of what? Are they subtracted from the total aumont of ppl that a ship can have (so less sailors) or are they something "more", as they were cargo?

Edited February 2, 2018 by blubasso

[Bristol Fashion]

22 minutes ago, maturin said:

Would be nice, but people usually ram for boarding anyways (this is realistic).

They need to fix both range of pulling as well as a maximum angle from which it can be done. The ramming into the wind and then boarding while the ships form a T is ludicrous.

You should have to be alongside them to board.

Edited February 2, 2018 by Bristol Fashion

[SKurj]

17 minutes ago, blubasso said:

Sorry, 30% of what? Are they subtracted from the total aumont of ppl that a ship can have (so less sailors) or are they something "more", as they were cargo?

yes, marines displace crew

[Sir Texas Sir]

19 minutes ago, blubasso said:

Sorry, 30% of what? Are they subtracted from the total aumont of ppl that a ship can have (so less sailors) or are they something "more", as they were cargo?

Yes marines take from you sailing crew.  A normal ship with say 200 crew are split in duties for what they can do:  Sail, Gunner, Repair, Boarding actions.   Well Marines are specialized so they only board.  If you have 20% marines than you have 40 Marines on board your ship and that is all they do is Board combat.  Which means you now only have 160 crew to man your sails and guns.  Also need to remember when you loose crew this percentage stays off crew total. You get racked and loose 100 crew now you only have 100 crew on you ship.  20% of those crew are still marines so you effectively now have only 80 crew to main your sails and guns.  This is why if you want to effectively hurt a board fit ship you hit the crew and take them down fast before they can board you.  Get them to burn there rum and than rake them again so they can't get crew back and now they can't man guns or sails effectively and they end up being not very effective in combat.

Edited February 2, 2018 by Sir Texas Sir

[Sea Fox]

Let's hope rage boarding does not return with this patch. Leeway I think really helped out in reducing boarding. I love the Mast fix and I think it's a good direction. Boarding however sucks. It has always sucked from the beginning and has never been right. 

I do not board anyone and I do everything possible to not be boarded. It is a silly mini game that comes down to mods over skill. I would rather fight like hell for 20 minutes or even an hour and 20 minutes and lose my ship beneath the waves than going to battle and be boarded in 2 minutes and lose that way

[maturin]

17 minutes ago, Bristol Fashion said:

They need to fix both range of pulling as well as a maximum angle from which it can be done. The ramming into the wind and then boarding while the ships form a T is ludicrous.

You should have to be alongside them to board.

Incorrect.

There are many representations of this fight, where the French boarded along the bowsprit.

And Boudriot writes that it was advantageous to board through an opponent's stern galleries when they missed stays (failed to tack). So literally T-boning.

 

The only thing that is completely ahistorical is the idea of 'grappling' or 'pulling' a 500-ton ship without first making contact with its hull. The best way to board was always to get his rigging entangled in your rigging. No running around cutting ropes like wannabe ninjas then.

[Guest]

1 minute ago, maturin said:

Incorrect.

There are many representations of this fight, where the French boarded along the bowsprit.

 

And Boudriot writes that it was advantageous to board through an opponent's stern galleries when they missed stays (failed to tack). So literally T-boning.

 

The only thing that is completely ahistorical is the idea of 'grappling' or 'pulling' a 500-ton ship without first making contact with its hull. The best way to board was always to get his rigging entangled in your rigging. No running around cutting ropes like wannabe ninjas then.

Am I right in thinking that grapples were used to secure two ships together, and not to pull one closer? 

[maturin]

1 minute ago, EliteDelta said:

Am I right in thinking that grapples were used to secure two ships together, and not to pull one closer? 

I don't really recall many mentions of grapples, in terms of iron hooks.

Ideally, his bowsprit rams into your mainmast shrouds and there's no need to secure the ships together because everything is hopelessly tangled. Then your quarterdeck guns pound his lightly-armed forecastle, and boarders away.

If you need to secure two ships together, any rope will do (it takes a super long piece of iron to make a grappling hook that can't just be cut anyhow). Sometimes the topmen would even lash the yardarms together.

[blubasso]

47 minutes ago, Sir Texas Sir said:

Yes marines take from you sailing crew.  A normal ship with say 200 crew are split in duties for what they can do:  Sail, Gunner, Repair, Boarding actions.   Well Marines are specialized so they only board.  If you have 20% marines than you have 40 Marines on board your ship and that is all they do is Board combat.  Which means you now only have 160 crew to man your sails and guns.  Also need to remember when you loose crew this percentage stays off crew total. You get racked and loose 100 crew now you only have 100 crew on you ship.  20% of those crew are still marines so you effectively now have only 80 crew to main your sails and guns.  This is why if you want to effectively hurt a board fit ship you hit the crew and take them down fast before they can board you.  Get them to burn there run and than rake them again so they can't get crew back and now they can't main guns or sails effectively and they end up being not very effective in combat.

Well, a clever commander should grape before boarding, than boarding in two waves:  the first one with the "big guns " (marines) and just after, if the boarding goes not well,  with the normal sailor. You as commander, has the responsability of safeness of your ship as first priority and the marines are Fighter, so they should manage a fight. They are expendible in this sense. So a good fight should be in two waves of men because a ship needs sailors rather marines.

I hope devs listen this, that's elementary tactics...

If devs will keep the minigame just as it is, for the sake of testing i will give it a try, but in the relese i will forget it. IMO it's now completely an arcade minigame without any elementary tactic of engagement.

Edited February 2, 2018 by blubasso

[Odol]

Just now, EliteDelta said:

Am I right in thinking that grapples were used to secure two ships together, and not to pull one closer? 

Actually they were used to pull also.  Sometimes if a ship got to close the rigging could get tangled.  But it wasnt that common. 

As seen here, the Nelson's Patented Bridge for Boarding 1st Rates."

[Bristol Fashion]

13 minutes ago, maturin said:

Incorrect.

There are many representations of this fight, where the French boarded along the bowsprit.

And Boudriot writes that it was advantageous to board through an opponent's stern galleries when they missed stays (failed to tack). So literally T-boning.

 

The only thing that is completely ahistorical is the idea of 'grappling' or 'pulling' a 500-ton ship without first making contact with its hull. The best way to board was always to get his rigging entangled in your rigging. No running around cutting ropes like wannabe ninjas then.

I have misrepresented my complaint then, right now enemy ships will form the cross bar of the T. Boarding ships low to high via the enemy ships bowsprit. Find me an example of this and I will withdraw my complaint.

[maturin]

2 minutes ago, Bristol Fashion said:

I have misrepresented my complaint then, right now enemy ships will form the cross bar of the T. Boarding ships low to high via the enemy ships bowsprit. Find me an example of this and I will withdraw my complaint.

See Boudriot's The Seventy-Four Gun Ship. This is the described as the best possible means of initiating a boarding action. Letting them T-Bone you. albeit at a shallow angle. Obviously best if this isn't happening at 11 knots, but that's a ramming issue, not a boarding issue.