Suggestions for optional naval skimishes

[PinkyDK]

Just to clarify (I already done the british campaign twice just to play and provide bug reports - might start 3rd or try the US campaign) but I'm a big fan of playing SOME ground battles - especially amphibious landings...The long winded land battles - especially with wonky pathfinding is after the 2nd run through not very interesting, but the game is stronger from having both options.

In the same story I would be super interested in having a few more playable and optional side skirmishes / quests - especially in the early british chapters for minor skirmishes:

Make a few smaller naval missions clearly labeled as optional with 1-2 smaller ships (perhaps a limit of 40 or 80 initially and later upto 120) with ships doing small unimportant missions with rewards only big enough to compensate for repairs and a small bonus. Maybe get rewards like 200 or 400 special rifles, some carronades or EIC cannons, mortars or cannons on top for making them very interesting?

Suggestions for missions from which the maps can be 100% water or reusing existing maps for easy development:

• Race the "insert name here" (select your fastest ship perhaps a 12 gun ship to reach a specific zone before another british ship with which you have a bet going - make it sail around an island or something and sail up against the wind so you have to zig zag) Maybe when you get there you encounter 2 enemy small 12-gun ships on patrol and you get control over the allied ship too.
• Sink the merchant (kill a single merchant with a small escort - merchant must be sunk to make an example - make the crew numerous and strong in melee to make it obvious not to board)
• Sink the pirate (same as above except it's a single armed ship which must be sunk to make an example - make the ship have a strong crew to make it obvious not top board)
• Battery ambush (remove the battery from a small island - either by taking up the gunfight or land troops on the back of the island... Maybe with 1-2 small enemy ships)
• Maybe even a variation of Battery Ambush where you take control of an enemy battery and use it to kill an enemy ship being anchored up in front of the battery. But this might not work unless the ship is hardcoded stationary and the battery is strong enough to kill it.
• Capture the smuggler, traitor, spy or whatever (board and capture a smuggler in an armed merchant or sloop-of-war to have him arrested - you may not necesarily keep the ship after - maybe it sank on it's way to port) If the ship is sunk mission could be a win or loss depending on what you think but with small or negative reward compared to boarding
• Similar you could make up a scenario to either cut down a mast or tear apart the sails on a merchant with plague on board - or maybe it's on fire so you cannot get close but somehow you just don't want to sink it...
• Kill the flagship (take on a group of 3 ships with only 2 ships of the same size - like allow 2 ships with a limit of 80 weight total to fight 3 or 4 identical weight ships. The missions is to sink 1 designated enemy flagship and make it to an exit zone. Like a hit'n'run (cutting off the head of the snake)

All these battles should be minor skirmishes to provide more optional content for the player and not take a lot of time. Also a good variation from the big battles coming up later. Many of these battles can also be used as a training ground for some of the combat mechanics a new player need to learn. Most of them at the same time should not take too much time to develope?

I hope it'll be possible

PinkyDK

[WilliamTheIII]

It does appear that what you are asking is for points of interest to essentially be made playable missions? One problem with this is that your crew and soldiers would become godlike very quickly. By the end of Chapter 2, most of your land units can be at 2 star. Naval units are able to reach 2 star in 1 battle while officers promote to rear admiral (I know a bug but still funny). Also, if there is no real reward then there is no point in playing the missions past the first go through. Weapons are a non issue as you will capture more than enough and decent money management will allow you to have plenty of the best weapons pretty early. You’d also want to avoid overcrowding the map as having a player fight a bunch of battles for one stage would certainly start to drag on. This is where POI’s excel! They allow for a lot of flavor missions and events to fire that are all done at the macro level rather than the micro. However, they too can still become overcrowded such as the one American stage where there are 8 total battles and POI’s. I do really like some of your battle ideas though and perhaps a separate challenge section can be added where you would play these missions. However, I do feel that POI provide a large amount of flavor that makes the game consistently fun without the hassle of playing a boat load of small and easy battles that result in little gain and a lot of work. 

[pandakraut]

If more battles were added experience gain would probably need to be slowed down to avoid the problem you're describing. Adding an extra minor battle per stage probably wouldn't clutter things too much? Though the number of PoI's might need to be reduced in some cases as well. I do also like having the PoIs available as well for the extra flavor without another battle that will rapidly become routine.

[PinkyDK]

I would like to still have the story line battles and the POIs stay as they are + the small skirmishes added.......And not a lot of them - As panda suggested just a few here and there for extra gameplay.
The point is the battles are extra - rarely providing anything big. But it gives a player like me a chance to prolong the playing experience for fun. And if someone like William just want to win the game he can skip them. Also the crew experience is ofcourse a thing to remember, but I haven't gotten any super crews yet anyway...

[WilliamTheIII]

Don't get me wrong, I definitely feel that more is better in most cases so long as things don't get overcrowded. So long as these battles are unique and provide something different, then that has the potential to be a lot of fun. I just would prefer not to have generic battles to grind through for extra stuff.