DLC ships and port bonuses

[Beeekonda]

^ Thats what I asked for in few topics, but w/e

[Greysteak]

@adminI understand that they need to be viable.  But rather than just making them OP again, how about a compromise?  Make their framing and planking types random like the elite notes.

[znôrt]

5 hours ago, Slim McSauce said:

Proving once again that the gear you have matters more than the skill you possess.

well, that's what a majority seemed to want. bonuses! funny that that doesn't bother you with crafted ships, but is the end of the world with a hardly competitive dlc ship ...

Edited July 16, 2019 by znôrt

[Farrago]

I can’t say I agree with the action: I would prefer a subscription model, no DLC, and everything available to all players through in game effort. But it’s been obvious they are headed towards making DLC purchases the only way to play the game without losing your mind (and every waking hour).

[Genevieve Malfleurs]

well, good news for all these dlc- ship-savers who come to club weaker enemies at kpr and turn to run whenever resistance appears. we got enough funny fast hercs and reqs in the game already.

[Slim McSauce]

40 minutes ago, znôrt said:

well, that's what a majority seemed to want. bonuses! funny that that doesn't bother you with crafted ships, but is the end of the world with a hardly competitive dlc ship ...

It does bother me with crafted ships. The last thing we needed was the delta between the have and have not (non pejorative) to increase.
All the extra bonuses, crafted or not makes one thing happen, trash players chances increase slightly when they have them, and decrease drastically without

Veteran and skilled players chances stay roughly the same without the bonuses, but increase drastically with them. So in the end when comparing newbs v pro's you've decreased the overall chance of the lower denominator of player to compete without extreme help from mods, and greatly boosted the skilled players relative immunity with the mods (which they're almost guaranteed to acquire because they're at the top)

Put it this way. A standard player has access to some regular ships, give this player a Renomee. A good starting ship. He needs it fast because when you start out you need to learn positioning and how to engage/disengage. You craft it Fir/Fir or Teak/fir for MAX possible speed. He even gets lucky and lands a ship with "Good Hope" refit for a slight boost in sailing.
A few standard upgrades later, he has a decent ship, topping out at 14.5 knts, little armor, few guns, but fast and very maneuver. A perfect ship for a new player.

You know what the first thing he runs into? A purple 4/5 port bonus Trinco with 4/5 on all bonuses, teak/teak, 75 thickness topping at a whopping 15knts loaded downwind.
That's what all these stacked bonuses do. It increases the berth between the standard and the elite. The elite players are already elite in skill, then you give them elite super ships and they become dominant to almost an absolute. You give a standard player the same ship? He cannot utilize it in the same way.

The idea that complicating ships to such a degree and thinking you're helping the little guy giving him access to the best, is false. It's counter balanced. The fairest play is when the outside influence of mods and upgrades is lessened, not increased. At least then it's consistent. Compare right now the stats between a standard frigate and a decked out frigate. The decked out frigate has SOL levels of thickness, corvette levels of speed and turn, insane resistance all around and unfounded ability. While the standard frigate has frigate thickness, frigate speed, frigate turn. It's no match. Balance has been screwed over. It was bad when gold ships became a thing and increased the already too high spread. Port bonuses made it much worse, crafted or not.

Edited July 16, 2019 by Slim McSauce

[Mad Dog Morgan]

DLC Ships, Port Bonuses, Mod Stacks and Alts.  Until all four are removed the game will never reach it's potential.  

DLC Ships cause too much crying.  

Port Bonuses and Mod Stacks create super ships that are more star wars than age of sail.

Alts ruin ever other aspect of the games core mechanics. 

 

[Mad Dog Morgan]

20 minutes ago, Farrago said:

I can’t say I agree with the action: I would prefer a subscription model, no DLC, and everything available to all players through in game effort. But it’s been obvious they are headed towards making DLC purchases the only way to play the game without losing your mind (and every waking hour).

On release I knew I simply didn't have the time to grind xp, unlock ships, craft ships and everything else that comes with that. Or even the time to commit to a clan and it's operations. 

So decided to roll a Pirate and live off the land (sea) so to speak.  I sail junk that I cap from NPC's or cheap ships that crafters dump on the market for sale as they grind higher. The only mods I put on ships come from chests or taken from enemy player ships.  The game is more enjoyable now in the few hours I have each week than ever before. 

On subscription unfortunately that is no longer popular model instead the cancer which is micro transactions & DLC's etc are.  There are certainly pros to subscription only, one of those would be immediate removal of almost all the alts.

 

[AeRoTR]

15 minutes ago, Koveras said:

Actually I don't believe that random port bonus' will make the DLCs viable. The Port bonus' is OP which is the reason why we're even having this discussion.. rather than fixing the symptoms - fix the problem.

I do agree port bonuses are still way OP! 

I did not like dlc instant redeem with port bonus, it should have been permit to be crafted. 

Some guy above says he redeemed pandora with 1 mast bonus. My friend redeemed pandora with bonuses more than 45 points port, what about this?!? Pay to win? 

How much do you spend to craft port bonus 4th rate, now one can craft one everyday without effort... 

[StaleMemes]

So I was at orientation for two days, if I understand correctly DLC ships now have random port bonuses?

Why would they go for the almost universally denounced 'fix' instead of just letting players redeem permits and craft with bonuses like normal ships?!!? Everyone liked that idea didn't they?

Who wants RNG port bonuses? Its like lets take two hated parts of NA and merge them. RNG crafting and OP DLC redeemables.

Now we have RNG OP redeemables. hello kittying hell.

[Aegishjalmur]

So basically DLC ships are where they should be - not straight pay2win but a nice backup / reserve option and people complain about it? People used to complain about DLC ships being pay2win on these forums constantly. First everyone moaned about them hurting the game and being pay2win and now this - it's simply pathetic... 

No port bonuses for DLC ships, please.

[AeRoTR]

What about guys who does not have dlc, who are not able to build a shipyard at port bonussed ports? Is this fair? 

[Guest]

6 minutes ago, AeRoTR said:

What about guys who does not have dlc, who are not able to build a shipyard at port bonussed ports? Is this fair? 

This is ofc not fair. But it is Devs intention to sell more DLCs and not to be fair to their 2nd tier customers.

[Beeekonda]

23 minutes ago, AeRoTR said:

What about guys who does not have dlc, who are not able to build a shipyard at port bonussed ports? Is this fair? 

I dont see it being DLC problem, but port bonus one.

 

[Potemkin]

Cant wait to see port bonus requins flooding patrol zones, thats gonna be fun.

[Barbarosa]

So developers admit that the game is gear based instead of skill based now?

You can't sell skill, you can sell gear.

I bet the game will be free to play soon with p2w shop. Started to believe that they intentionally create imbalances to open gaps for current and possible DLC sales.
Soon we will understand what happened to Santa Cecilia and Diana

Almost everybody complain about ridiculous port bonuses and instead of fixing it, they break the game even more...

Edited July 17, 2019 by Barbarosa

[Potemkin]

2 minutes ago, Barbarosa said:

So developers admit that the game is gear based instead of skill based now?

You can't sell skill, you can sell gear.

I bet the game will be free to play soon with p2w shop. Started to believe that they intentionally create imbalances to create gaps for current and poaaible DLC sales.
Soon we will understand what happened to Santa Cecilia and Diana

 

Easy there boss, we're not there yet. Theres still alot of fun to be had if you look in the right places.

[Slim McSauce]

6 hours ago, StaleMemes said:

Why would they go for the almost universally denounced 'fix' instead of just letting players redeem permits and craft with bonuses like normal ships?!!? Everyone liked that idea didn't they?

They did! A lot of people saying this is a much better solution than having the ships themselves be redeemable. You could redeem the permit, put it on market if you wanted, have some build it for you, or build it yourself. You could sell the ships, the ships could be capturable not immune to capture. Overall a lot more sense.

But no gamelabs had to be the ultimate casuals and remove all crafting from the equation making it a dummy boy system of redeem every day, no selling, no capture, no market around these ships which could have existed, bolstering and justifying their implementation into the game. 

Edited July 17, 2019 by Slim McSauce

[Baptiste Gallouédec]

Wow, "i do'nt want to take part in the eco or crafting, neither join a clan, but i want the same benefits".

Devs really listen to a small population of whiners while everyone complain and make suggestions about RvR, imbalance between nations, ressource trade, the pb max br and 1st rate meta with no positive action taken..

 

Release a dlc for every single ship model already, at least it will create more diversity on the sea.

Edited July 17, 2019 by Baptiste Gallouédec

[Takehitsu]

This game has simply become too ridiculous. The first issue a player faces is this stonewall of making money because the economic model doesnt work for more than 400 players anymore. (We see over 1000 a day now).

The second wall is theres this mass of dlc ships which are now outperforming hard grinder crafting ships. And there is LITERALLY no risk for losing them. 

The third wall is if you dont PvP your literally castrating yourself because pvp earns 4 times that of npc fights and missions. 

The solutions are to buy ten Russian alts to use the OP economic Russian Bermuda islands to kidds harbour for 2 mil reals a day and around 4k dubs. And buy all the dlc for instantly redeemable ships that ultimately are breaking the game. I took a break the last time i made a suggestion and the results were negatively received. I may take a permanent break now because the game is not age of Sail anymore. it Ocean railroad tycoon mixed with Pub'g in 18th century ships. I dont find it entertaining that way. 

 

THIS GAME IS NOT A SANDBOX ANYMORE 

[Thonys]

if you look very closely you will see that the dlc ships are first nerved (yesterday update)and after that you get the port bonus  (just to satisfy the customer with a little buff on the bonus side, and from devs prospective a logical decision i think )

a standard dlc without post bonus is a kano with a sail on it 

it is very simple, if not redeemed at a port bonus port it is  a drag queen...

so that said ,  it was not a good idea to start this conversation in the first place ....

Edited July 17, 2019 by Thonys

[LegoLarry]

 

 I don't see a big issue with the random port bonus on DLC to be honest,  they are mostly quite poor in comparison to national shipbuild ports.

 As for players without access, I see in Dutch nation a lot of cheap national port bonus ships cheap and many eager to help anyone who shouts up in nation chat.

Of course maybe this is a different story within other nations but that is more down to population of nation if this is the case.

I only have the Hercules and given Pandora so isn't a case of protecting my onions so to speak.

As for people saying it's hard to make money for new guys....... with cargo and passenger missions it's never been as easy as it is now.

 

 

Edited July 17, 2019 by LegoLarry

[C0deX]

@admin

Great job to give the redeem ships random port bonus.

Everyone sails with port Bonus, the system is now better balanced.

The sales figures will rise because the ships are now well playable in the midgame.

[AeRoTR]

7 minutes ago, C0deX said:

@admin

Great job to give the redeem ships random port bonus.

Everyone sails with port Bonus, the system is now better balanced.

The sales figures will rise because the ships are now well playable in the midgame.

Are you real or are you a fake account trolling here? Or there is an epic sarcasm which I can not understand...

[C0deX]

Neither fake or sarcasm. A praise for the implementation, wich I fully support.

With these changes, you can recommend the DLC ships again.

The game has more players than the twenty players who regulary get upset here.

Simple facts. Developer always need money. Nobody has to play the game. Everyone can buy DLCs.