Ships should not sink..

[Slim McSauce]

Unless they've been leaked. Ships at 0 health should still be afloat and controllable. Ships at 0 health sail slow, lose masts extremely easy and are susceptible to being graped down and crew shocked. Ships at 0 health do not auto surrender but surrender by order of the captain when he's comfortable that he has lost. 

The benefit to this is that it's more authentic. Of course ships do not sink from damage do the decks. Ships on fire do not sink, they burn to the waterline. It's gameplay safe, ships already move at extremely reduced speed when low structure. Not only that but they lose guns faster, lose crew easier and have mast fallen in less shots. 

A ship at 0 health survives as long as the enemy allows it to pretty much. Sure the crew can still man guns, turn yards and command the rudder. But seldom will any of this save the ship from being finished off. It's expected you surrender to save your crew ( there shouod be mechanics encouraging you to do this ) as well as mechanics encouraging you to hold out as long as you can in certain scenarios.

A ship in this state is pretty much a sitting duck, it's disabled but not finished. All it takes is for some shots to the waterline, some grape or a boarding manuever to finish off a ship. Why do we need this exactly? For the authenticity. It's more in line with how battles really take place and opens up RP scenarios that otherwise wouldn't exist. Ships that hit 0 health do not sink unless provoked to do so. A ship can be left where it is and returned to for loot after the battle, as well as to take the prize. No more losing the prize at the expense of having the battle.

 

Edited July 14, 2019 by Slim McSauce

[StaleMemes]

35 minutes ago, Slim McSauce said:

Unless they've been leaked. Ships at 0 health should still be afloat and controllable. Ships at 0 health sail slow, lose masts extremely easy and are susceptible to being graped down and crew shocked. Ships at 0 health do not auto surrender but surrender by order of the captain when he's comfortable that he has lost. 

The benefit to this is that it's more authentic. Of course ships do not sink from damage do the decks. Ships on fire do not sink, they burn to the waterline. It's gameplay safe, ships already move at extremely reduced speed when low structure. Not only that but they lose guns faster, lose crew easier and have mast fallen in less shots. 

A ship at 0 health survives as long as the enemy allows it to pretty much. Sure the crew can still man guns, turn yards and command the rudder. But seldom will any of this save the ship from being finished off. It's expected you surrender to save your crew ( there shouod be mechanics encouraging you to do this ) as well as mechanics encouraging you to hold out as long as you can in certain scenarios.

A ship in this state is pretty much a sitting duck, it's disabled but not finished. All it takes is for some shots to the waterline, some grape or a boarding manuever to finish off a ship. Why do we need this exactly? For the authenticity. It's more in line with how battles really take place and opens up RP scenarios that otherwise wouldn't exist. Ships that hit 0 health do not sink unless provoked to do so. A ship can be left where it is and returned to for loot after the battle, as well as to take the prize. No more losing the prize at the expense of having the battle.

 

I agree and I've thought about it a lot, for me the problem is that there is no currently way to simulate a captain's fear of death or compassion for his crew ingame, so players will keep fighting in absurd situations and it will just be annoying. I think amping up the crew and cannon damage on crippled ships would help, by making it easier to finish them off completely. I would also like to see a morale surrender mechanic, obviously would have to be careful not to make it cheesable. For instance, if a ship has taken extreme damage to its hull (equivalent to what would currently sink a ship) and takes 10x as much damage as it deals over a 2 minute period, the ship crew surrender. Just an example.

[Slim McSauce]

@StaleMemes If a ship loses 75% of it's crew outside of boarding it could auto surrender. By the time you hit 0 structure you've probably already lost half your guns and a third or more of your crew, on your way to losing all masts and sailing 1 or 2knts. It wouldn't take much even in current damage model to finish off a downed ship. What's important is that the end result is authentic and not the ship sinking just because.

[Never]

I really like this idea, it would make battles feel a lot more authentic and real plus you'd have all the heavily damaged ships floating around instead of sunk to the bottom of the sea, which looks a lot more like a battlefield. I often think that a lot the mechanics are complex except for the crew, which historically was one of the most important aspects of a ship. I would nice if this idea could be implemented along side more crew mechanics. Like crew that levels up same as the captains and can gain exp ranks with small bonuses. Then it would give players a reason to want to save their crew instead of having to lose it and restart with crew level 1. 

If anyone has ever played a Total War game, I'd suggest a system like the soldiers exp gain from that game. 9 ranks of exp levels that are shared among the active crew, if crew dies and the total active is replenished then the exp level gets averaged out. But if you surrender, you keep your crew. Each crew rank could come with a small stat bonus. 

Edited July 14, 2019 by Never

[Farrago]

I like the suggestion but see a few problems if this is applied to player ships.

A ship that is still afloat is still alive. If not tagged within 1:45 it can simply escape.

A ship that is still alive can repair and become a problem for you again.

I don’t foresee an auto-surender function ever getting the threshold right in a way that pleases the player pop.

So, you’re faced with changing a pretty big mechanic (when one can leave battle) in order to implement.

I agree there should be a mechanic to encourage a captain to surrender and save his crew’s lives. Have AI auto-surrender and provide the player captain who surrenders an XP bonus perhaps? Something like a multiple of the damage he dealt.

 

Edited July 14, 2019 by Farrago

[Slim McSauce]

@Farrago You raise reasonable concerns. The last thing we want is a ship being revived from the dead that otherwise would be out of the battle.

[Guest]

Imo the HP of the ship should reflect its capability to fight, the more a ship is damaged the less the crew are able to fight and in the end might "Surrender" as we know it which mostly happened. Either that or maybe crew killed in PvP engagements should cost more to replace, so people would rather surrender their ship and keep their crew instead of maybe costing 10 times as much to replace them as of today, because today they arent really any value in them other then cannon fodder.

This could also potentially lean into other interesting builds like crew resistance and not building 1st rates of fir fir because they would loose a ton of crew if facing any other lineship

[Never]

1 hour ago, Farrago said:

I like the suggestion but see a few problems if this is applied to player ships.

A ship that is still afloat is still alive. If not tagged within 1:45 it can simply escape.

A ship that is still alive can repair and become a problem for you again.

I don’t foresee an auto-surender function ever getting the threshold right in a way that pleases the player pop.

So, you’re faced with changing a pretty big mechanic (when one can leave battle) in order to implement.

I agree there should be a mechanic to encourage a captain to surrender and save his crew’s lives. Have AI auto-surrender and provide the player captain who surrenders an XP bonus perhaps? Something like a multiple of the damage he dealt.

 

I think auto surrender would have to be it really. Perhaps adding crew moral as an active value during the whole battle instead of only relevant in boarding as a value you can see all the time. People lose ships due to depleted morale during boarding too and that's just how it is; it would just be added to long range fighting as well. But morale would have to be 0-5 before a ship surrenders, only when a ship and crew is extremely heavily damaged would crew morale ever get that low. You pretty much would've sunk with our current system so I don't see much difference if it ship surrenders instead of sinking due to the same conditions.

Higher rank captains could have a rally skill to raise morale, usable once or twice per battle for a minute or so, giving you a chance to repair if you're able. 

[Guest]

Humans shouldn't die, unless all of their internal organs are jelly and they have been shot with a bullet after. This is your logic. Sorry but this is laughable, this isnt real life hon, some things just wont be the same as the real sea

[Slim McSauce]

2 hours ago, Never said:

I think auto surrender would have to be it really. Perhaps adding crew moral as an active value during the whole battle instead of only relevant in boarding as a value you can see all the time. People lose ships due to depleted morale during boarding too and that's just how it is; it would just be added to long range fighting as well. But morale would have to be 0-5 before a ship surrenders, only when a ship and crew is extremely heavily damaged would crew morale ever get that low.

I would have to agree, that's a great idea. 
The lower the morale, the more penalty to things like reload speed, yard turning and repair speed?
I would like to see a morale system in combat on top of the one we have for boarding.
I think it would add a fun and interesting dynamic to battles.
 

Edited July 15, 2019 by Slim McSauce

[StaleMemes]

19 minutes ago, Slim McSauce said:

I would have to agree, that's a great idea. 
The lower the morale, the more penalty to things like reload speed, yard turning and repair speed?
I would like to see a morale system in combat on top of the one we have for boarding.
I think it would add a fun and interesting dynamic to battles.
 

Game labs have lots of experience with detailed morale models from other games, so they could improve the existing one a lot if it will have a greater importance in battle. Damage taken, rate of damage taken, friendly ships vicinity, rate and crew difference of ships nearby, % of friendly fleet lost, % of enemy fleet destroyed, etc could all be factors.

[Slim McSauce]

19 minutes ago, StaleMemes said:

Game labs have lots of experience with detailed morale models from other games, so they could improve the existing one a lot if it will have a greater importance in battle. Damage taken, rate of damage taken, friendly ships vicinity, rate and crew difference of ships nearby, % of friendly fleet lost, % of enemy fleet destroyed, etc could all be factors.

They really do, I feel like this right up their ally and something they make actually take pleasure in doing since their so good at it.
I've played Ultimate General, it's a real contender to the total war series in my mind. The logistics in that game are insane in a good way.
The new Ultimate Admiral has me doing double takes. It looks good (and I mean good). Really good in fact. (But NA is where it's at) 

Edited July 15, 2019 by Slim McSauce