Port BR's reduction / RvR alliances

[OjK]

Current BR's probably were fine when there was 1000 players.
Now, with average player number of 350 players (Steam Charts - last 4 months), including all of the alts and all of the different time zones, BR's are out of the sky.
Oh, and the average of 350 includes the people on PvE server O.o

Most of those big ports won't see any PB, as there are simply not enough people to fill up the BR reasonably.

Maybe it's time to reduce the BR's on the ports (cut by half?) or finally implement some politics in the game so nations could cooperate to attack/defend some ports?

Just look how enormous number of PB's taken place recently...

Edited November 23, 2018 by OjK

[vazco]

Recent fall of RvR popularity is not caused so much by PB BR, but by increase of price of 1st rates and by BR required to flip a port.

 

BR for PB's could be lowered, but not by 50%, rather by 25%. Otherwise you could fill in a PB with just 2 ships.

It's probably also worth to consider lowering number of ships able to enter a battle in OW  from 25 to eg 15.

[Draymoor]

44 minutes ago, OjK said:

or finally implement some politics in the game so nations could cooperate to attack/defend some ports?

+1
This, please 

[Angus MacDuff]

You could also limit the number of 1st/2nd rates allowed. 

[OjK]

4 minutes ago, vazco said:

Recent fall of RvR popularity is not caused so much by PB BR, but by increase of price of 1st rates and by BR required to flip a port.

True, but also meanwhile we swapped from basic BR per ship of 580 (old L'Ocean) for 450 (current Buc)
Which also raised the total number of players required by another 25%

All together, RvR is nearly dead at the moment.

I used to open NA Map by Felix to see where is the action.
Now I open it to see is there ANY action...

[Slim McSauce]

I think making PB's a clan only thing made them kind of pointless. You no longer have people coordinating over nation to raise hostilities, one clan has to take charge and not everybody wants the burden of an entire port on their hands. Just to set a port timer is a huge amount of money a day.

The days of an entire nation coming together for a PB were better imo. Sure you had less control over what happened, but everybody was involved (even if it was just screening) people liked being a part of the action, now you have to jump  through 30 hoops to get a PB.

[Draymoor]

25 minutes ago, Angus MacDuff said:

You could also limit the number of 1st/2nd rates allowed. 

This plus getting rid of clan based PBs and making them nation based would add a lot more PBs, imho. More awareness being raised in nations about port battles for nations, in the form of notices and sticky messages, system messages in Nation chat, having a PB tab in your quest/mission window. More reasons to have them, like rewards for every player involved, in the form of reward chests, general items, doubloons. Removing clan controlled ports and simply giving ownership to the entire nation. Nations need more reasons to act as nations, PBs could easily do that. 

[Farrago]

The problem is line ships are so expensive, most folks have yet to bite the bullet and risk them. Yes, you can fight a PB in any ship, but trying to run up hostility in 5th rates is a very time consuming task and tough to do within a PB window unless you have a lot of players. And no one has a lot of players now.

[Capn Rocko]

Take away the 2 day commitment (hostility and port battle) and you will see more PBs. Hostility missions introduced a level of fairness, but (let's be honest) they suck. It's hard to get people to be available at the same time for 2 consecutive days and they have to risk losing their 1st rates twice. I'd rather see the flag system (or something else entirely) implemented. I don't think that BR is the reason that RvR is struggling. 

[Raf Van Boom]

1v1 port battles, let's do it.

[staun]

We wanted expensive ships and we got it. RvR is now hardcore, so by trimming down Br for portbattles will just turn it back, but on smaller ships.

Yeah RvR will suffer, but then again thats what happens when we turned the game more hardcore, witch was what ppl asked for.  Now more the ever King of the sea is those with skil and dedication. isent that what we all asked for?

 

[staun]

7 minutes ago, rediii said:

problem is the high cost of ships AND the high hostility needed in RvR so noone is going for RvR at the moment. Its too high risk at the moment to lose a fleet of 1st rates for many who didnt stockpile them before the patch.

 

Its not connected to BR of portbattles

Think your answer to me earlier on a post on using 1 rate, when lowering the br to flip a port was. High risk high reward.

[staun]

8 minutes ago, rediii said:

its just the missing hostility change for 3rd rates rather than 1st rates.

You can use 3 rate, it just takes a bit longer to flip. We will see the result of expensive ships, no doubt in my mind. But we got what we asked for. Ppl simply wont have a ship to sail. 

For me personally the patch just killed the last motivation. Didn’t even go to help in the defend of Fajardo. But it is not about me. Na is a hardcore game. Think that what most of us like about it. Thats skills and dedication has meaning. This patch is a good test if thats the way we should go. But we need to give it more than a week before we just says it dosent work.

[staun]

5 hours ago, rediii said:

 

very depressive you are little padavan  

It is your teaching Master. Who am I to go agsinst it. 

I understand why ppl want lower Br for Pb and hostillity. Not much fund in grinding Ai’s to flip a port. 

A lower br to raise hostillity will make it harder to stop an attack. You once where in Sweden, that got multi flipped a couple of times. Do think at that time you from time to time managede either to prevent a multiflip ore make sure the Pb’s wasent on the same time. With a lower BR, that will be even harder. A lower br will effectively stop the defenders chance to counter a flip, depending on how much it is lowered ofc.

Lower Br in Pb. Do actually understand why ppl think so. With the base we have now only a few navtion actually can fill a br of 8000. But there is also some issues with a low Br. When you have put together a pb fleet that is competive, you are trying to get in. We often seen players just looking for PvP attacking it and they dont have to be limited in a br.

But what we see imo is the result of ppl wanted ships to be expensive. Ppl simple can’t replace there ships. No ships, well I guess no fights. Now ppl dont have unlimited ships and do actually have to think hard if a fight is worth to take and if they lose a ship, will they get in trouble later.

Personbaly I think they went the wrong way. But I also understand why ppl wanted RvR to be more hardcore. My guess is that devs have desided that hardcore is the best way for there game in the long run. Yes it will proberbly cost on the short distance until they have had a change of the player base.

Edited November 24, 2018 by staun

[Tiedemann]

Less BR does not mater when you can't enter the pb because of screening, but RvR is very dead at the moment so something needs to be done for sure. I always support getting the diplomatic mechanic back in game, if it get some tweaks so we don't end up with the 2 team blob. 

[Hethwill]

imo, we went the clanwars way. the way many wanted. see where we are.

imo with full nation standing behind conquest such state of affairs wouldn't be happening.

System must... imho... change. clanwars do not work consistently.

[Custard]

21 hours ago, Hethwill the Red Duke said:

imo, we went the clanwars way. the way many wanted. see where we are.

imo with full nation standing behind conquest such state of affairs wouldn't be happening.

System must... imho... change. clanwars do not work consistently.

Couldn't disagree more Hethwill, player numbers and RVR is down as a direct consequence of this last patch

Clanwars is only half hearted implemented anyway it needs more love not less @Christendom would probably have a view on this

[Jack Jones]

22 hours ago, Hethwill the Red Duke said:

imo, we went the clanwars way. the way many wanted. see where we are.

imo with full nation standing behind conquest such state of affairs wouldn't be happening.

System must... imho... change. clanwars do not work consistently.

Could not agree more with Hethwill.

Lower the cost of ships.

Make  nations matter again.

You will involve solo and small clan players again.

Edited November 25, 2018 by Flash Jack

[Cetric de Cornusiac]

There have been suggestions for organizing RvR, diplomacy, binding policies for nations. Fighting alts, spies.

People argued in favor of their "freedom" and clans being the rule.

So live with the consequences of your bad decision. Clans rule. Means chaos on the national level.

[Hethwill]

1 hour ago, Custard said:

Couldn't disagree more Hethwill, player numbers and RVR is down as a direct consequence of this last patch

Clanwars is only half hearted implemented anyway it needs more love not less @Christendom would probably have a view on this

For sure. Can be discussed and it all bears down to how much a clan wants to risk for whatever reward  

1 hour ago, Intrepido said:

You dont have a clue about RvR, which doesnt surprise me at all.

 

The system worked fine until patch 27 arrived. And what did it change in patch 27? The costs of RvR ships. High costs, less RvR. It is so simple that even a guy doesnt playing RvR could understand.

No, it is not cost at all. Even with 1 durability but national level effort there was way more conquest than after focus on clanwars, but you are 100% right - clanwars system solved a lot of the abuses and exploits - that everyone can see if they were around.

Don't want to risk ? Sit in your hands. Risk not worth the reward ? Sit in your hands.

All comes down to how much you want to Conquer. Don't feel like risking anything ? Sure, let the ships sit in port.

( sorry if you were absent from my gameplay m8 and really sorry for not sending you regular and daily reports of our squadron activities. Actually we never got informed that we must have sent you regular report of our achievements or failures but hey... you are right. I know nothing and shouldn't even dare to post...But we are discussing a game mechanic not players, so I would expect you, myself and everyone else to stick to the game and not the players. Thanks a ton. /sarcasm off )

[AeRoTR]

I do not understand the RVR. Aside from few profiting and rare wood ports, what is the motivation to capture enemy port?

Risk a ship costing 4000-9000 dubloons plus hundred thousand reals for perma mods. Spent lots of time with hostility with risk of pvp, risk to lose ship again. 

Yay we have got the port, so I have lost my ship in port battle, 5000 dubs + 200k reals mode + plus rare woods now in bottom of the ocean. What did I earn? Sometimes a good battle, 100 dubloons (few first rates?) for sinking enemy ships, I looted 1000 dubloons which lies in my cargo in ocean floor, nice my national flag on that port, what else? 

Why should I RVR again? I would not! 

If capturing a port would give shinny dubloons for victors, enough to build 2 ships, at least replace a sunk ship, YES I would RVR. 

Capturing a port should definitly give dubloons as loot.

 

[victor]

13 minutes ago, rediii said:

Why? you can enter portbattles in prince de neufchatels. In shallows probably even lynxes fit?

 

RvR is not happening because the hostility needed is too high. you have to do it in 1st rates right now but they are expensive as hell so the risk doesnt fit. It has to be changed

(Edited my previous post btw)

I think that RVR is not happening (as well as a lot of other things) because more and more people is fed up about the growing "hardcore" and "austerity" mood of this game that requires players to grind so many hours ingame just to be able to do anything.

I used to trade a lot and make missions or chasing IAs around western Cuba and Yucatan (and being sunk quite often in the process) and sometimes I  joined countergank fleets in my capital waters. Also I participated in some screening action or port battles. With the last patch I simply stopped playing: the fun/effort ratio is no longer high enough.

Edited November 25, 2018 by victor

[Christendom]

6 minutes ago, rediii said:

Why? you can enter portbattles in prince de neufchatels. In shallows probably even lynxes fit?

 

RvR is not happening because the hostility needed is too high. you have to do it in 1st rates right now but they are expensive as hell so the risk doesnt fit. It has to be changed

(Edited my previous post btw)

The problem all hinges upon doubloons.

Lineships are now expensive and risky to lose.  In typical gamelabs fashion one aspect of the game was changed and others that rely on that aspect, were not.  A large portion of the ports are still 1st rate grinds and thus risking lineships to either flip or fight them is deemed not worth it.  Why bother?  

Ports aren't worth it.  Owning a port pays out in reals, yet reals don't really matter anymore.  Doubloons are the end all be all.  Maybe ports should pay out in dubs to make them matter?  Rare woods drop from traders everywhere and are more accessible.  Also demand has dropped for the woods.  Take more ports that pay out in reals?  Why bother?

Risk vs Reward.  Doubloons are RNG, players can get several thousands a day in the patrol zones while only risking frigates or from simply doing PVE.  Why bother?

This patch has killed any incentive to do RvR anywhere except maybe the shallows.        

[Christendom]

11 minutes ago, Intrepido said:

The solution is quite easy.

RvR ships must have reasonable prices so no one will need to cheat to get dubloons the same way some nations got conquests marks.

or we bring back 4th rate PBs.  

[Christendom]

5 hours ago, Intrepido said:

Full mono agamenon fleet: Boring fight, easy to screen out due to being easy to identfy the PB fleet.

And the problem still remain with the other non-fourth rate ports.

 

It is more practical to remove the issue that brought us here: the economy hardcore changes of the patch 27.

I rather liked the full Aggie on Aggie PBS.  Was more about tactics and individual skill than woods and mods.