Reduction in wood speed bonus for higher rated ships?

[Hullabaloo]

Saw a Pandora being chased upwind by a Wasa today. That's mad. I suspect the Wasa was fir/fir (there are a lot of these about, which tells it's own story). This ship has probably long sailed but I don't think the balance is quite right. I have no problem with the Wasa in terms of balancing when compared to other 3rd rates and it should have it's uses, but a 5th rate interceptor should not be one of them. I didn't see the end result but it's not much fun being out paced by a ship 3 classes higher. I see no point in sailing a teak/wo Agga when a fir/fir Wasa is superior in virtually every way. 

I'm just using the Wasa as an example, it's part of a wider problem with Port Bonuses and balancing I think

It occurred to me that a reduction in the speed bonus for lighter wood types as you move up through the rates might be a way to ease it? Does anyone else think this is a problem?

Edited August 13, 2019 by Hullabaloo

[Guest]

Agree about the problem at hand. It feels like everything has to be fir/fir lately to escape the super fast big ships (they are mostly Wasa's).

Yesterday I captured a teak/teak Endymion and thought I'd give it a try as a hunter. I did have some fun with it, but by the end of the day I'd found myself in a 1v5 where 4 of the enemy ships were faster than me (Two trincs, endy, and p-frig), and the other one was a Rattvisan. When it finally turned to a brawl, my teak/teak beauty brawled like a hero, but of course there was so much chain I couldn't even catch two barely alive enemies before I got chain boarded. 

The point is that anything other than fir/fir gets caught too easily, and honestly fir/fir isn't very fun to play because of how squishy it is. I think we either need less speed mods, or nerf them all significantly, or as Hullabaloo suggested, change how they affect the different classes.

I know people will say "Historically a 3rd rate could often catch a 5th rate". Sure. But we need game balance, and if a Wasa can catch most every 5th rate, why ever sail a 5th rate. 

[Farrago]

45 minutes ago, EliteDelta said:

The point is that anything other than fir/fir gets caught too easily, and honestly fir/fir isn't very fun to play because of how squishy it is. I think we either need less speed mods, or nerf them all significantly, or as Hullabaloo suggested, change how they affect the different classes.

Yesterday my fir fir Very Fast 3 sail port bonus Trinc outfiitted with carros and carrying only 3x reps was run down by two Wasas. Granted, I had yet to open any slots on the Trinc and had no super speed mods installed, but this just isn’t balanced. 

[Horatiou]

I'm glad to see I am not the only one concerned about the ridiculously fast Wasa's. I tried looking up on the max speed a Wasa (Vasa) was capable of but could never really find anything. Personally, I am tired of the Fir/Fir meta. At least try to balance this out, especially for the higher rate of ships.

Edited August 13, 2019 by George Burton
Clarification + Explanation.

[van der Clam]

I had a Wasa keeping speed on me with my Fir/Fir Prince at proper angle. SoL speeds need a serious nerf.

[Horatiou]

1 minute ago, Borch said:

 

What this game could have been if they would change SoL speed, right?

Oh, the irony. 

[LegoLarry]

 Perhaps a solution would be to hard cap different rate ships at different max speeds.

 

[Slim McSauce]

In very simple terms it seems fir/fir ships do pretty similar speeds regardless of the rate. A fir/fir Trincomolee will do about 13.5knts, A fir/fir pandora, about 13.7, not sure about 4th rates plus, but I've heard from a shipbuilder a fir/fir Wasa will hit about 13.3, so there's not much difference there and when you account for things like port bonuses, it can vary greatly.

The problem is what the problem has been for the longest time, how do you consolidate the differences between something like a teak/wo frigate, and a fir/fir 3rd rate, the 3rd rate having higher health and more guns, less thickness and less turn. There's a lot of numbers at play, I'm not gonna say we're that far off from balance, because it's certainly closer than it was.

Fine tweaking of the ships base speed values should reel it in, but I think the ultimate solution would be variable winds, as a sort of second layer to a ships sailing profile. Lighter ships being carried farther and faster in lighter winds, heavy ships dominating in heavier winds, but that would have to include punishment for the lighter ship captain, capsizing or breaking topmast.
 

[AeRoTR]

Elite Spanish and Pirate make them still too fast. Thus you need to guess if they have the elite sails, adjust your point of escape to their slowest angle. I would love to see elite upgrades to be removed from the game.

 

[Teutonic]

4 hours ago, EliteDelta said:

Agree about the problem at hand. It feels like everything has to be fir/fir lately to escape the super fast big ships (they are mostly Wasa's).

Yesterday I captured a teak/teak Endymion and thought I'd give it a try as a hunter. I did have some fun with it, but by the end of the day I'd found myself in a 1v5 where 4 of the enemy ships were faster than me (Two trincs, endy, and p-frig), and the other one was a Rattvisan. When it finally turned to a brawl, my teak/teak beauty brawled like a hero, but of course there was so much chain I couldn't even catch two barely alive enemies before I got chain boarded. 

The point is that anything other than fir/fir gets caught too easily, and honestly fir/fir isn't very fun to play because of how squishy it is. I think we either need less speed mods, or nerf them all significantly, or as Hullabaloo suggested, change how they affect the different classes.

I know people will say "Historically a 3rd rate could often catch a 5th rate". Sure. But we need game balance, and if a Wasa can catch most every 5th rate, why ever sail a 5th rate. 

It's the same issue I have where the Wasa is just straight up destroying any reason to Sail 4th rates (maybe except a fail fit speed Inger).

I have yet to hear anyone give me 1 good reason to sail a 4th rate when You can sail a Wasa for literally "pennies" more.

Generally all lineships, 3rds, 2nds, 1st should have a clear flat speed nerf of at least 1 knt each.

Then Lineships should all have their BR increased.

Lastly, Wasa should become more expensive to craft. increase the doubloon cost as one example. There are a ton more balance changes I would say - but it would go off topic.

 

It does bring up a good question, We have mods and books that are split based on 6-7th, 4-5th, and 1-3rd. why aren't woods like this too?

[Holm Hansen]

1 hour ago, Teutonic said:

...

Generally all lineships, 3rds, 2nds, 1st should have a clear flat speed nerf of at least 1 knt each.

...

please no

This will only punish the players again which sail a normally built lineship. They are now already slower than they were in reality.

There was a suggestion that certain wood combinations should not allowed for lineships, so the problem would be eliminated. Instead of nerfing everything, just because some player stack mods and use wood types which were never used for that in the reality.

Edited August 13, 2019 by Holm Hansen

[Horatiou]

51 minutes ago, Holm Hansen said:

please no

This will only punish the players again which sail a normally built lineship. They are now already slower than they were in reality.

There was a suggestion that certain wood combinations should not allowed for lineships, so the problem would be eliminated. Instead of nerfing everything, just because some player stack mods and use wood types which were never used for that in the reality.

That sounds like a good solution. Restrict certain ships from using specific wood combos. 

[Botq]

3 hours ago, AeRoTR said:

Elite Spanish and Pirate make them still too fast. Thus you need to guess if they have the elite sails, adjust your point of escape to their slowest angle. I would love to see elite upgrades to be removed from the game.

 

u want to cut already low amount of content ?

[William Death]

Hard nerfs and restrictions don't work at solving these issues. They will, however, create more new fun and engaging metas .

 

Building a game with balanced bonuses/negatives does work. We didn't have these issues in early 2016 when the maximum bonus from all speed mods and lightest wood was less than 10%, and the maximum speed negatives from all tanky mods was less than -10%.

Since I doubt we'll ever go back to that simple system, maybe try something similar but a little different:

• Wood type should have minimal effect on any stats of the ship. The difference in tank between an oak/oak and a lo/wo should be 3% at the most. This will remove the need to have meta woods to be competitive
• Books and upgrades should have minimal effect on the speed, turn rate, and HP/thickness values. Instead let us spec books for other things, like turn acceleration, gun reload, crew morale, faster sail handling, etc. Things that don't make-or-break combat as much.
• Return to diverse sailing profiles. (see more below)

 

3 hours ago, Slim McSauce said:

The problem is what the problem has been for the longest time, how do you consolidate the differences between something like a teak/wo frigate, and a fir/fir 3rd rate, the 3rd rate having higher health and more guns, less thickness and less turn.

This is part of the answer to this question:

Diversify the sailing profiles:

There was a time when ships actually had vastly different sailing profiles, instead of the variations of the same profiles that we have now. Profiles, that I might add, are (to my knowledge) derived from the in-game sail plans, which are incomplete for many ships (look at how few ships carry the full suite of staysails, royals, skysails, studdingsails, mizzen topgallants/royals, etc.). So while the profiles are maybe a little more realistic now (but not too realistic--we're still moving forward when we're 45° off the wind lol), they're certainly not better for balance. 

Back in the day, a teak 5th rate was good for OW PvP. If you came across a fir or bermuda 3rd rate (which weren't all that common, as they could only catch noobs who ran downwind), all you had to do was point upwind and sail away (or go in close and rake him to death then laugh as he rages in chat). If you were in your Agamemnon and didn't want to fight the Bellona that tagged you, you could point upwind and get away. This is because we didn't have massive bonuses from mods and woods, and didn't have almost identical sailing profiles across similar ships. 

All that being said, even now a teak/teak Trinco or Endy can outrun a light 3rd rate upwind, but you cannot ever get in range of Wasa's 6x 9pd chaser chain + gunnery reload bonus or you're done for. #properlybalanced

Theres nothing wrong with a speed fit 3rd rate to hunt down fifth rates (that was, after all, part of the real-life 3rd rate SOL's job description). But there needs to be a balance such that frigates stand a strong chance of escaping when a 3rd rate comes into sight. Hard caps or restrictions are not a path to that balance.

 

 

To the people complaining lineships are too fast while simultaneously wanting historical realism: you do know that larger ships were, on the whole, faster than smaller ships, given moderate wind/sea conditions? Hull speed and all that. Victory was an excellent sailor, 12kn+ by some reports. The Spanish third rate that was in development was reported as doing over 14kn IRL. I'll just leave that there for you, and suggest you consider that there can be a happy balance between historical realism and playability of the game. And that balance does not involve further limiting the kinds of ships players can use or build. 

[Sento de Benimaclet]

First and second rates only live/white. Third rates  live oak, white, caguairan, sabicu woods only. Fourth rates same woods and mahogany, teak. Fifth , sixth  and seventh rates all woods.  Fir/fir wasas is not real. (is only an idea). Cheers!!!

[Sir Texas Sir]

8 hours ago, Farrago said:

Yesterday my fir fir Very Fast 3 sail port bonus Trinc outfiitted with carros and carrying only 3x reps was run down by two Wasas. Granted, I had yet to open any slots on the Trinc and had no super speed mods installed, but this just isn’t balanced. 

A fir/Fir Trinc is 1 knt faster than a fir/fir Wasa so not exactly sure how you got run down other than the fact they can shoot the crap out of your sails and slow  you down.  Than again most the time when your dealing with being out number most will not win.

[van der Clam]

9 hours ago, Borch said:

 

What this game could have been if they would change SoL speed, right?

Touché. However, a number change in code is a bit different than wanting complete design changes of a game and complaining about it not being designed and implemented. But, good call.

7 hours ago, LegoLarry said:

 Perhaps a solution would be to hard cap different rate ships at different max speeds.

 

Yes please, as long as the speed range leaves some overlapping. I could see a lightly built Victory being almost as fast as some 3rd rates. Something like:

4 hours ago, Holm Hansen said:

please no

This will only punish the players again which sail a normally built lineship. They are now already slower than they were in reality.

There was a suggestion that certain wood combinations should not allowed for lineships, so the problem would be eliminated. Instead of nerfing everything, just because some player stack mods and use wood types which were never used for that in the reality.

This almost sounds good, except, I feel IRL we would build ships out of woods we could find. As much as this game isn't a true sandbox, it still wants to be, and so we should have wood combos of our choice. The nu,bers are just off a bit, imo.

[Raf Van Boom]

I agree, the lighter the ship the faster it should go (historical accuracy be damned). It gives purpose as interceptors to those lowbie 5th rates and lower, sailing them with the new damage model is dangerous as it is.

[Razee]

Agreed, or maybe make it so that different rates get different +% of speed mods. Like adding copper to a 5th gives 3,5%speed adding it to a 4th gives 3% and to a 3th +2,5% for example

[Guest]

10 hours ago, William Death said:

To the people complaining lineships are too fast while simultaneously wanting historical realism: you do know that larger ships were, on the whole, faster than smaller ships, given moderate wind/sea conditions? Hull speed and all that. Victory was an excellent sailor, 12kn+ by some reports. The Spanish third rate that was in development was reported as doing over 14kn IRL. I'll just leave that there for you, and suggest you consider that there can be a happy balance between historical realism and playability of the game. And that balance does not involve further limiting the kinds of ships players can use or build. 

hold your hats here, this was at their best point of sail and alot of wind. I've read that most sols had terrible sailing capabilities over beam reach like 60* off the wind, which would make sense considering their not so aerodynamic look and having problems with the leeway where the wind would push it down and backwards if they went against the wind.

[Holm Hansen]

9 hours ago, van der Clam said:

...

This almost sounds good, except, I feel IRL we would build ships out of woods we could find. As much as this game isn't a true sandbox, it still wants to be, and so we should have wood combos of our choice. The nu,bers are just off a bit, imo.

There is no need to build a lineship made of extremely light wood, which reflects fir/fir here. If someone has no access to the exclusive woods, he can also take oak. In addition, in reality, the availability of suitable wood restricted the constructed numbers of lineships too.

Fir/fir, or Bermuda Cedar are a pure fantasy materials in lineship-building, although they are possible in other ship classes.

It would also be easy to implement in terms of programming and would not disturb the balancing of the other ships.

Edited August 14, 2019 by Holm Hansen

[AeRoTR]

13 hours ago, o7Captain said:

u want to cut already low amount of content

Is this content for you? , but I know you like to make 14,5 knots and catch the noobs in your fir/fir and elite spanish cristian and wasa

This concerns about big ships being speed boats had been adressed many time, yet admin does not care. 

Wish it was the other way around, so accept it as it is, and adapt. 

[Hullabaloo]

Admin might do it if he thinks it will sell more copies. Historical accuracy is less important than a fun game and a fun game becomes popular. Smaller ships must have a good chance of escaping larger ships, the game doesn't work otherwise. Its no fun for less experienced players being executed by Wasas.

Restricting light wood types altogether is nice and simple and it's not that much of a restriction.

Perhaps?

1st- 4th rates - no fir or cedar
5th rates - no fir*
6-7th rates - any

* I think this might help a little with the fir/fir chasing 5th rates that just chain and run too. oak/oak would be the cheap crafted 5th rate, a lot more fun to fight.

Make up some crap about 'lack of structural integrity' in the crafting window and your done!

[Zoky]

Fir/fir wasa has about the same base speed as teak/teak trinco/endy, same turning speed (and is better at tacking), much more armor and sail hp, much more firepower, gets same bonuses from all speed modules and speed books except elite spanish where wasa gets more from it then trinco/endy due to wasa having bigger percentage of square sails!

Why change whole wood mechanic? Wouldn't it be easier to just nerf wasa? I don't see people complaining about agas, ingers or any other big ship. Its always wasa. 

As a side note all big ships turn way too good compered to 5th rates

[Hullabaloo]

I think because it is a broader problem that Wasa just exemplifies. Wasa is good ship but not so OP when compared to other 3rd rates, if you nerf it, then how?  You just open up a whole new can of balancing worms, you want it to remain a useful ship.  It's not really changing the WHOLE wood mechanic really, just a simple restriction on light woods for larger ships means no new balancing required and problem alleviated across the board. Atm fir/fir is very cheap, very effective andvery boring.

Edited August 14, 2019 by Hullabaloo