Battle system core ruleset discussion

[admin]

9 hours ago, Banished Privateer said:

Here we go again with bs mechanics. French Princes and Requins throughout the entire day almost continuously were tagging Prussian players around Ays and running away. Their only intention was to prevent ships from attacking friendly ships, keeping in battle, forming revenge fleets, rescuing ships. Last battle today, attacked by Prince to make sure French L'Ocean can safely reach port. Prince did not fight, shot my sails 5 times and left the battle after 3-4 minutes from the start. Same happened to Phaserburn. 

This happened also in 4 different battles earlier today, people watching stream could see that. They attack and instantly run away. This is ruining NA and if someone doesn't consider it griefing, I don't know what they wanna call it. People say that according to admin "delaying actions" are legal. We need clarification from Devs on that, as this is happening literally every day. This is also outside any RvR activity, no PB screening, no hostility etc. Just OW PvP, gathering revenge fleets "reinforcements" by keeping enemies in battle or tagging them all the time, shooting their sails only, this makes the game unplayable in my opinion. The battle with Phaser, Prince did a max range tag and just escaped the battle too. 

It's a grey area.
There is no formal rules that do not allow attacking a player, shooting and running. Because they are based on initial core design elements built around instanced battles.  
But these core design elements cause such frustrations and problems that are not good for the long term of the game. 
Before the release the decision must be made about those core systems and here are the options.

Current ruleset is based on these ideologies

• I want to attack someone and people far away must not enter = "i must be able to sink you solo if i want to"
• I want to be able to sink a 1st rate in a cutter (old heated topic). 
• I want to be able to run away if i want to (because my ship is fast)
• I do not want a player from far to join my battle, because its mine. 

If the goals is to increase pvp these ideologies can be rethought or abandoned as they dont increase an amount of pvp. 

• Problem 1 - inability to help your own.
  • The common message from rookies in national chats are well known - "I got attacked near XXX port - please help if you can" or "I see enemy ships - lets tag them - come help"… 
  • Usual answer in chat - silence and "tough luck" - as you CANT. I think its time to accept the fact that distance based ROE is bad and is reducing pvp and only helps solo hunters (which based on data are a huge minority).  
  • This is a problem because we know that pvp assists has 100% of correlation with retention. If you dont participate in group activities you drop from the game 10x faster.  
• Problem 1.1 part of lack of group pvp
  • There is actually not enough ganking (hold on and bear with me).  For accounts created in December: Only 5% of players have pvp assists and only 1% of players have more than 10 pvp assists. 
  • Again the problem because assist increase retention
• Problem 2 Speed
  • Fast ship controls the OW pvp, and heavy battle ready ships do not have anything to counter against the gank even if they outnumber enemies in guns.
• Problem 3 combat ready ship balance - described by OP in the post.
  • When line ship is fighting 3 fast frigates to win the lineship must not make a single mistake
  • When 3 fast frigates fight the lineship they can always run away if they make a mistake

 

So why dont we just rework those ideologies from scratch and focus them on the main goal - increase pvp and group pvp per hour for all (not only solo hunter in a speed fitted frigate). 

Examples of clear solutions solving the problems and increasing meaningful pvp on the WAR server

• This is a war server. Why escape options? Whats the point? If you attacked - fight!
  • Patrol rules for the whole world. Circle of death.
  • If you are ready to attack someone - be ready to die and fight to the end. 
  • Sure some will cry about it  - tough luck like they say in national chats - but it will keep only meaningful pvp.
• Battle is always open for the weaker side 
  • This is a war server - this is a pvp game with the goal to increase amount of pvp for all. There is no point to close the battle for the weaker side. Let them escalate. This becomes the goal. 
  • Then you can come to help your own, and know someone will come to help.
  • Then you can build more friendships and get assists 
  • Then you will stumble to more battles and will have more pvp kills per hour. 

Basically.

• When improving ROE - Remove all features from ROE that reduce pvp per hour. Add features that grow the pvp per hour. 
• Ignore the cries like "but tumbado is 3000km away".
• Check only one parameter when determining the outcome of changes - number of PVP battles per hour and number of assists.
• Ignore the rest.
   

This will also solve the problem described in the post (with the move to weight systems because with proper broadside weight - prince will die in 1 min). 
 

PS
Current number for War server for accounts created in December
1 pvp kill every 8 hours in game per pvp engaged player. 
1 pvp kill every 24 hours in game total for the server
 

[Hethwill]

wow admin... just wow 😮

 

[Njord]

8 minutes ago, admin said:

This is a war server. Why escape options? Whats the point? If you attacked - fight!

• Patrol rules for the whole world. Circle of death.
• If you are ready to attack someone - be ready to die and fight to the end. 
• Sure some will cry about it  - tough luck like they say in national chats - but it will keep only meaningful pvp.

 

I think it would be better if the "Circle of death" was centered around the defender / target, getting smaller as usual but instead of getting destroyed the defender can leave as soon as the attacker is outside of the circle. So at some point the circle would be in effective carronade range and the attacker either has to actually commit to the fight or leave the circle and then the defender should be able to leave without being tagged again ( more speed / longer invisibility or going straight to the nearest open port ). This would help with griefing a lot.

[AeRoTR]

27 minutes ago, admin said:

Battle is always open for the weaker side 

• This is a war server - this is a pvp game with the goal to increase amount of pvp for all. There is no point to close the battle for the weaker side. Let them escalate. This becomes the goal. 
• Then you can come to help your own, and know someone will come to help.
• Then you can build more friendships and get assists 
• Then you will stumble to more battles and will have more pvp kills per hour. 

 

I think this one is great  , this can increase pvp. As time passes, late joiners should spawn more far away from center of gravity of battle.

 

Also I would prefer control perk default for all ships.

note: I hate circle of death, because many ships die due to circle, not the battle, it shrinks super fast after some point. I think that in patrols circle should stop shrinking at some reasonable point, currently it becomes too little, or should shrink at much slower rate.

[Hethwill]

3 minutes ago, AeRoTR said:

I think this one is great  , this can increase pvp.

We tested it before. Also known as....Signalling perk.

[Ellias]

15 minutes ago, admin said:

Problem 1 - inability to help your own.

• The common message from rookies in national chats are well known - "I got attacked near XXX port - please help if you can" or "I see enemy ships - lets tag them - come help"… 
• Usual answer in chat - silence and "tough luck" - as you CANT. I think its time to accept the fact that distance based ROE is bad and is reducing pvp and only helps solo hunters (which based on data are a huge minority).  
• This is a problem because we know that pvp assists has 100% of correlation with retention. If you dont participate in group activities you drop from the game 10x faster.  

I do believe in opposite, solo play should be encouraged instead of forced out. Its not easy to find and penetrate in a group that you would enjoy sailing. Besides you should have options of content if none of your friends are online. Solo hunting should not be a style of "huge minority", it should be one of the very available options to sail.

I do agree that having friends help a lot with retention. Eventually we are mostly here to sail with our friends. 

 

25 minutes ago, admin said:

Problem 1.1 part of lack of group pvp

• There is actually not enough ganking (hold on and bear with me).  For accounts created in December: Only 5% of players have pvp assists and only 1% of players have more than 10 pvp assists. 
• Again the problem because assist increase retention

We don't bother to sail in a group (for ganging) because there are very few players sailing around and very hard to find them. Besides ganging is not fun because does't involve skill, most of the veterans avoid that for this reason. Moreover, you have a chance to encounter 2 types of ships; solo line ships which doing AI hunting or missions and swarm of Hercules players. It is very hard to find a proper ship that can deal with both. You either choose to become pray to swarm of mighty Hercules or can't able to touch the liner. I blame Hercules for this.

 

33 minutes ago, admin said:

Problem 2 Speed

• Fast ship controls the OW pvp, and heavy battle ready ships do not have anything to counter against the gank even if they outnumber enemies in guns.

Lets be more clear and once again finger point to mighty Hercules.

35 minutes ago, admin said:

Problem 3 combat ready ship balance - described by OP in the post.

• When line ship is fighting 3 fast frigates to win the lineship must not make a single mistake
• When 3 fast frigates fight the lineship they can always run away if they make a mistake

You can insert 5th rate instead of lineship as well. 3 Hercules can escape and fight anything and there is no other ship that can match this.

Better to be careful with data when reaching conclusions since it is very easy to interpret it to justify our theories.

My personal experience and understanding tells me that DLC Hercules is killing the game.

 

[Iroquois Confederacy]

My faith that signalling wouldn't be abused is minimal.  The playstyle of the solo player is already difficult forca number of reasons.  If people are getting tagged and then the enemy is running away, signalling would have the exact same impact as them simply calling out, "Hey, there's a bunch of fore and afters tagging and running away."  Either people would come, or they wouldn't.

At the very least, if a signalling perk were brought back, I'd want to see a perk for solo players that locks down fights so it is simply "what you see is what you get."

As for heavier ships always losing to faster - what about the weight based damage that was discussed in an earlier thread?

[Hethwill]

Lineships should be the bread and butter of Conquest, not OW.

They are too fast, the turning ( regarding it is a game ) is acceptable, especially given they can rear at fabulous speeds and anchor in the eye of the wind without leeway even. ( all ships do though )

When they form in a line, a battle fleet, they perform as expected.

All other rates, 4th down to 7th should be the bread and butter of open sea warfare, as they suit solo and group gameplay.

 

[Ellias]

I would suggest developers to be very careful with the person came out with the idea for DLC Hercules and Requin, former perfect to kill OW PvP, second perfect to kill new players.

If you need money, as Sweden we can stop defending all ports with strategic recourses. Lots of Alts would have to buy DLC for nation change. I am talking about big money here. 😂

[Licinio Chiavari]

An extremely delicate matter that can totally change, save or destroy the game.

I foresee more dangers than gains with the, let me say, brutal proposal from @admin.

Reply to a complex issue, to be meaningful, has to be complex; using a battleaxe is not a good idea.

First point: retreat should be allowed if possible. The mindset of "no retreat" and "fight to the death", even if nicely sounding - and very romantic - are pure crap military wise. French Army (yes: FRENCH 😂) at WWI eve had the dogma of "elan" and attack at all costs, always. It was dropped in less than a month: a plain suicide is not a reasonable way to fight.

On the other hand we have to solve OT griefing, partecipation in OW PvP and balance.

1. Solve all ships OW speeds. The more (potentially) deadly a battle could be, more precise should be OW speed so the tag. It's not possible my 14.4 kts Privateer hits 36/37 kts at beam reach in OW, and my 13.9 Requin barely 30. I am sure there're issues in OW speeds.

Simplest solution could be that OW speed should be exactly two times combat one at same point of sail, taking into account all factors (like sail damage and force sail mods). I think it could be done coding wise without being a pain.

This could solve the tag-run--tag-run issues between OW-Combat (and obviously Navy Loodsman has to be reworked - like a plain +2% speed?).

2. Single joining circle. No more the crappiness of my mate starting a battle N of me from north side... and I have to join from his side in place of my approuching route (in this case S).

But... No more choosen positional joining: if I arrive from S side of the circle, I will spawn at X mts S of southmost enemy: in the end the old tabletop games reinforcements entering from borders.

Joining distance from closest enemy being a function of battle timer: the later I arrive, the more afar I will join.

I think a minimum distance of 300/400 if joining within minutes, up to 1000 mt if at latest (see 3.).

3. Battle stays open for 20/30 minutes.

This to allow both side "reinforcements" to join.

4. No more tagging to stop enemy escape: all ship with a reworked "area control". And no more the crappiness of having to manouver from my best point of sail to catch a running enemy to keep him tagged.

5. Reworked area control. 

Initial area control around 500 mt. Then 5 (or more, or equal to the time spent in control: if I remained 13 minutes in control, I have to stay 13 minutes out of it to leave) minutes required out of control to leave: I have really to make enemies to fall behind to leave.

But, to reduce OT griefing, area control start to shrink after 10 (?) minutes of battle slowly reducing down to 200 (?) mt by battle closed (20/30 minutes so): if I want to keep enemy engaged I have to get closer and closer.

Coupled with eventual ball damage per weight and not diameter, things could be hot for a frigate keeping a ship of the line in battle for long.

Bound to this: granted this kind of RoE, if enemy escapes, I think he rightfully retreated: so longer invisibility and/or X minutes cooldown to retag him. To furthermore counter abuses.

6. For God sake: no circle of death. Not great realism.

We have already PZs with related metas (like barely 11 kts frigates).

 

[Suricato Rojo]

1 hour ago, admin said:

• This is a war server. Why escape options? Whats the point? If you attacked - fight!
  • Patrol rules for the whole world. Circle of death.
  • If you are ready to attack someone - be ready to die and fight to the end. 
  • Sure some will cry about it  - tough luck like they say in national chats - but it will keep only meaningful pvp.
• Battle is always open for the weaker side 

@admin Its only my opinion based on +7000 hours playing... but I think that if you implement what you say it will be the end of this game.

[Kejsaren]

1 hour ago, admin said:

This is a war server. Why escape options? Whats the point? If you attacked - fight!

• Patrol rules for the whole world. Circle of death.

This is the worst idea since DLC and I don't even know where to begin explaing why. I will edit with a more thorough explanation later on.

(Actually @Licinio Chiavaribeat me to it., and coverered pretty much my thoughts)

 

 

 

 

Edited January 18, 2019 by Castañon del Rey

[Sir Loorkon]

Those are very interesting ideas. The only thing I could not live with is the circle of death in OW. I mostly sail alone. I do not want to join teamspeak or groups to often because I am talking with my wife or I am afk for a while. Forcing me into group action will kill the game for me because it will force me to be present and communicating all the time. Impossible. I have no problem to be attacked by superior numbers but if I am forced to join a ganking group to stay competitive, I will quitt this game. I do not like the circle of death. It's like playing NA legends and has nothing to do with OW PvP.

[Tac]

1 hour ago, admin said:

It's a grey area.
There is no formal rules that do not allow attacking a player, shooting and running. Because they are based on initial core design elements built around instanced battles.  
But these core design elements cause such frustrations and problems that are not good for the long term of the game. 
Before the release the decision must be made about those core systems and here are the options.

Current ruleset is based on these ideologies

• I want to attack someone and people far away must not enter = "i must be able to sink you solo if i want to"
• I want to be able to sink a 1st rate in a cutter (old heated topic). 
• I want to be able to run away if i want to (because my ship is fast)
• I do not want a player from far to join my battle, because its mine. 

If the goals is to increase pvp these ideologies can be rethought or abandoned as they dont increase an amount of pvp. 

• Problem 1 - inability to help your own.
  • The common message from rookies in national chats are well known - "I got attacked near XXX port - please help if you can" or "I see enemy ships - lets tag them - come help"… 
  • Usual answer in chat - silence and "tough luck" - as you CANT. I think its time to accept the fact that distance based ROE is bad and is reducing pvp and only helps solo hunters (which based on data are a huge minority).  
  • This is a problem because we know that pvp assists has 100% of correlation with retention. If you dont participate in group activities you drop from the game 10x faster.  
• Problem 1.1 part of lack of group pvp
  • There is actually not enough ganking (hold on and bear with me).  For accounts created in December: Only 5% of players have pvp assists and only 1% of players have more than 10 pvp assists. 
  • Again the problem because assist increase retention
• Problem 2 Speed
  • Fast ship controls the OW pvp, and heavy battle ready ships do not have anything to counter against the gank even if they outnumber enemies in guns.
• Problem 3 combat ready ship balance - described by OP in the post.
  • When line ship is fighting 3 fast frigates to win the lineship must not make a single mistake
  • When 3 fast frigates fight the lineship they can always run away if they make a mistake

 

So why dont we just rework those ideologies from scratch and focus them on the main goal - increase pvp and group pvp per hour for all (not only solo hunter in a speed fitted frigate). 

Examples of clear solutions solving the problems and increasing meaningful pvp on the WAR server

• This is a war server. Why escape options? Whats the point? If you attacked - fight!
  • Patrol rules for the whole world. Circle of death.
  • If you are ready to attack someone - be ready to die and fight to the end. 
  • Sure some will cry about it  - tough luck like they say in national chats - but it will keep only meaningful pvp.
• Battle is always open for the weaker side 
  • This is a war server - this is a pvp game with the goal to increase amount of pvp for all. There is no point to close the battle for the weaker side. Let them escalate. This becomes the goal. 
  • Then you can come to help your own, and know someone will come to help.
  • Then you can build more friendships and get assists 
  • Then you will stumble to more battles and will have more pvp kills per hour. 

Basically.

• When improving ROE - Remove all features from ROE that reduce pvp per hour. Add features that grow the pvp per hour. 
• Ignore the cries like "but tumbado is 3000km away".
• Check only one parameter when determining the outcome of changes - number of PVP battles per hour and number of assists.
• Ignore the rest.
   

This will also solve the problem described in the post (with the move to weight systems because with proper broadside weight - prince will die in 1 min). 
 

PS
Current number for War server for accounts created in December
1 pvp kill every 8 hours in game per pvp engaged player. 
1 pvp kill every 24 hours in game total for the server
 

With test server becoming live next week would it be an option to test on there ? Or would this create a large delay to release?

[Havelock]

I like it. It doesnt discourage solo players if you can only join the weaker side. If you as a lone wolf are struggling against 1 heavier ship or 2 lighter ships youre just bad.

I summon @jodgi, who will squeak like a girl when reading this proposal.

[Corona Lisa]

1 hour ago, admin said:

So why dont we just rework those ideologies from scratch and focus them on the main goal - increase pvp and group pvp per hour for all (not only solo hunter in a speed fitted frigate). 

Battle is always open for the weaker side 

So its like old signaling perk. I like it because there will be less ganks and more balanced fights. Maybe you should adjust the rate to 1,5:1, so gankers will still have some advantage and dont get completely discouraged to attack a Ram Dinark. I believe @TommyShelby used to put a lot of thoughts into that, you could read some old topics to balance it out.

 

Still tho, major problem with PvP is that you cant decide when to stop playing. Also the new looting system didnt help.

[Licinio Chiavari]

1 hour ago, Banished Privateer said:

1. Requins and Princes can easily run away in patrol zones. @Licinio ChiavariChiavari on a Requin was chased by 6 ships (2 Princes, Cutter, 2 Hercules and Surprise)

You were a group of 2 Princes and 3 Hercules and 1 Cutter. In PZ, damn.

But you know: I am a master Escapologist 😎. No idea how many would last so long.

It was matter of lasting 2 more minutes to leave safely... but PZ circle is deadly small in last minutes. 😥😥😥

Joking aside.

Your points are good. And PZ ROE in OW is a plain suicide IMO.

Edited January 18, 2019 by Licinio Chiavari

[Iroquois Confederacy]

21 minutes ago, Havelock said:

I like it. It doesnt discourage solo players if you can only join the weaker side. If you as a lone wolf are struggling against 1 heavier ship or 2 lighter ships youre just bad.

I summon @jodgi, who will squeak like a girl when reading this proposal.

Here, merchants would always be able to ask for reinforcements.  I'm not certain that's a good thing.

[Iroquois Confederacy]

2 hours ago, admin said:

If the goals is to increase pvp these ideologies can be rethought or abandoned as they dont increase an amount of pvp. 

I think this is the wrong goal, actually.  If that were the goal, we would already have the solution made and tested:  Naval Action:  Legends.

The goal should be to accurately portray the feel of the setting.  Sailing in the 1800s wasn't constant combat.  There were stretches of quiet, excitement when something was spotted, and loss and frustration.  Accurate representation should naturally have combat follow the ebbs and flows seen in the period.

[Vernon Merrill]

Everyone sailing around in Floating Battery, Cartegena-Fitted L'Oceans...   sounds like fun.   

Or not..   

1) Stumble upon battle that NEVER closes

2) Assist in sinking ship thats half-dead from fighting for the last hour

3) Beat my chest about how good I am...

 

No thanks.

[Licinio Chiavari]

9 minutes ago, Vernon Merrill said:

Everyone sailing around in Floating Battery, Cartegena-Fitted L'Oceans...   sounds like fun.   

Or not..   

1) Stumble upon battle that NEVER closes

2) Assist in sinking ship thats half-dead from fighting for the last hour

3) Beat my chest about how good I am...

 

No thanks.

Nicely nailed.

[RKY]

No circle of death in OW plz.

CIrcle of death is an ineffective feature. every single fights ends up being close to the circle edge => not working.

[Ellias]

1. Have a bait ship. (fast enough)

2. Attack superior enemy. 

3. Sail downwind to drag them close to circle.

4. Join with 2-3 mortars and have fun 

[jodgi]

1 hour ago, Havelock said:

I summon @jodgi, who will squeak like a girl when reading this proposal.

No, I can't be bothered when we "want more pvp" while ignoring the root issue why ppl don't fight.

Go ahead and make OW like a shitty matchmaker, it's not like I'm OW's greatest fan so when you collectively want to ruin OW I might as well step aside because this will serve me more than any of you.

Let's do round two or three of pleasing the "I want to help my friends" crowd.

[Hethwill]

11 minutes ago, Intrepido said:

And that issue is happening quite often in NA while it is hard to me to find such heroics in History.

That's why we should test broadside weight asap. But i fear too many sols...

beauty and the beast...