New Feature Proposals - Combat

[admin]

Please propose your ideas in the following way.

• 1 Post = 1 Proposal.
  • Players will vote on 1 proposals only. Multiple proposals will mix different subjects and confuse.
  • Multitiered or multi subject proposals will be removed.
• Keep the proposals on the topic subjects
• Do not comment. The thread is for proposals only
• If you want to improve on other people proposals contact them so they can update the post. 
• Best proposals will be brought up by the system based on likes and we will comment on them once in a while. Proposals which dont get community attention will be ignored and will sink to the bottom.

 

Example of formatting 
Correct example

• Cannon crafting proposals
  • Cannon crafting change rationale
  • Cannon crafting current version and whats wrong
  • Proposal on cannon crafting change

Incorrect version

One post 

• Cannon crafting proposal (should be a separate in a economy section)
• Trading proposal (should be a separate post in an economy section)
• Hostility proposal (should be a separate post in RVR section)
• DLC ship proposal (should be a separate post in DLC section

[Trawn]

Looting killed ships using longboats from your ship. 

 

If enemy dies upwind from you, by pressing a button you send your ship´s rowing longboats to pick the loot. They might have some weight limit. E.g. you open cargo of killed trader using your longboats and see some repairs and trade cargo (that 100t weight each) so you can only pick the repairs and decide, if you want to drag your 2000t ship against the wind to loot the trade goods.

 

I mean, there are not many things more disappointing then killing a ship, then spending 10minutes tacking your 1st rate against the wind just to loot loki rune on pve server.

[MassimoSud]

Guacata very shallow water port

We have many players who love 7th and 6th rates, life is difficult for them.
Let's make Guacata and its lake a patrol zone accessible only to 7th and 6th rank. Even new players may find it fun with ships that cost almost nothing.
I know the port is RED, but I'm sure that for the sake of the game they would gladly give up a port so that it can become a free town.

[s2bu]

POST battle analysis: AFTER (*maybe even with a delay of x hours) a battle ppl should be able to save the "replay"-data of that battle. In replay mode you should be able to move around freely with the freecam or "lock on" any ship to follow it around, have information on the builds/upgrades of all ships involved, have some time compression options and have a detailed combatlog i.e. penetration value of the ball as it left the barrel, as it hit the surface, angle of impact, thickness at point of impact, effective thickness, damage done, also repairs... in the first step dont worry too much about how you present that combatlog information visually - i'm sure some1 can come up with a way to deal with that in ACT or a similar program - just provide the information.

*added the delay after writing the rest of the stuff to make sure the detailed build of a ship may still be "secret" while that person is trying to get away in OW.

[JDMonster]

Practice fight system against friends/people in your own nation

• One of the biggest complaints that new players have is how steep the learning curve is.  This in itself is not an issue, but what it takes to learn is.  New players who may not be in a clan probably won't be able to afford to lose ships in PvP to gain experience (not talking in game XP, but them actually learning how to fight), and when they do get attacked they often lose quite badly not just because of ship differences but individual skill levels being extremely different.  Giving them a way to practice against friendly players would allow them to gain valuable experience without major loss of resources.  This will result in a better new player experience and thus higher new player retention.
• Requirements/details for the practice fights:

1. Players must be in the same port
2. Players must be in the same nation
3. Players can only play with ships that they have and are in the same port
4. Battle ends when hull (center bar) hitpoints reach 25% and or boarding action is completed (Done to preserve a small semblance of realism)
5. Repairs consumed during the battle are not refunded.  The ships still sustain the damage received during the battle and thus need to be repaired/replenished.  This is done so that there is a small cost associated with the practice fight (Irl military exercise's aren't free)
6. No rewards (XP, Reals, Doubloons) are rewarded for the battle

Edited April 29, 2020 by JDMonster
dropped a word

[Botq]

Dont allow ships of higher rank exceeding the pz limit to tag any ship which is fit for the patrol zone.

Example: People in Redoutables tagging small ships in 4th rate patrol zones. Shouldnt be allowed.

Edit: This proposal was added. @admin I would take special care of some Ruyter 🧐

Edited July 9, 2020 by Botq

[z4ys]

1 hour ago, Hethwill said:

- If Loki does not make damage %% for 120 seconds, control reverts back to AI.

[Moscalb]

Buff of obusers & congreve guns. So useless now((

[Genevieve Malfleurs]

battle-rating should be affected by the ship-upgrades

[Slotburg]

Give the opportunity to turn off chat with enemies in battle.

Thanks !

[Genevieve Malfleurs]

introduce combat-missions for ship-types! "leftover-ships" will be hopefully used more than nowadays.

[A N D I]

PvP Battles in Patrol Zone

 

I've been playing that game for about 1 1/2 years now.
What i'd really like to see, at least in the Patrolzone (PZ)would be "free for all" battles.

 

Not 2 teams fighting each other, but everyone is able to join in the nation he is in. And as the PZ stands for - its a graveyard, you go there to either win or die!

 

My thought is, if there is for example a battle "pirates vs british" - and a russian joins in it turns into "british vs russia vs pirate", then a swede joins in and it'll be a "pirate vs british vs russia vs swede" and so on... battle stays open for 10minutes for people to join (as it was announced that it'll be sooner or later, and it was once 25minutes, which i really liked)

The circle to join wont be two circles anymore,  just one circle (as it is with PBs)

So you enter it and join as the nation you're playing for... if others pass by, they just see that there is a battle, but no more BR.

Players don't see in the PZ the nations which are fighting, they only see that there is a fight. and the total amount of players inside. No "5vs3", but "8".

 

Players of the same nation are teamed when they join. Only one team wins. Basically its like a team-deathmatch.

 

Circle will be like current PZ, but battle ends when only one team(nation) is alive.

I think, that would give the way pvp is done in the PZ  a little refresh.

 

For classic 1vs1 - there would be still the Solo-Patrolzone

 

best wishes.

Edited May 3, 2020 by Andi421
additional idea

[William Death]

Allow us to mount 2 bow and 2 stern chasers on all ships that don't have any chasers there. (Maybe just one bow chaser on the smallest ships like the 7th rates with their fine bows)

Pros:

• It would increase the use of ships that are currently under-enjoyed, like Essex, Belle Poule, Pavel, and Cerberus.
• It levels the playing field among most of the ships. Ships that already had a strong chaser advantage like Trincomalee, Ingermanland, Wasa, Rattvisan, Christian, Wapen, etc, will still maintain that advantage.
• Its historically accurate (captains could move chasers from the broadside if they wanted to, or simply have their carpenter place some gunports in the bow).
• Larger ships sometimes have the caliber required to demast ships with their chasers.
• Chasers are useful for graping when you're close.

 

Cons:

• It would allow people to troll in more ships. Imagine a fleet of Privateers and Navy Brigs trolling a shallow PB fleet.
  • But since its been announced we're moving to a damage-based tagging mechanic, there's no need to really worry about this. 
• People will complain that maybe some ships didn't show chasers on their plans.
  • Go read the point above, and read some historical accounts about when captains would fit chasers to their ships to help chase their prey (or flee).
• Would require some modeling work on all the ships without chasers.
  • I'm not a programmer so I don't know how much work this is, but I think its a worthwhile improvement to the game.

 

Other comments:

Despite moving to a damage-based tag-timer-reset mechanic, chasers are still important. Chipping a few percent off your enemy's sails as you chase can make the difference between catching or not catching him.

Edited April 23, 2020 by William Death
grammar: missing a word

[Charles MacMinor]

Actual gun mechanics:

* F1/F2 etc: disable firing of particular gun decks, but crew isn't transferred

* F5: complete broadside is deactivated, crew is being transferred

 

Proposal:

Additional possibility of deactivating single gun decks and transferring the particular crew

[Lucio Marcio VII]

Surrender for inspection.

Add in battle a second type of surrender where the captain (especially for traders) can surrender to a chasing enemy without losing his ship. "The capturer" can then board it, inspect the ship and its cargo, loot what he want and after it can decide to capture the ship, sink it or let him leave in peace. This last option was historically accurate as the trader didn’t enlarge the persecution making things easy to the attacker hoping this gesture will save their lives.

This also gives the option to players, who generally don't like to sink traders, interact with them without causing so much damage.

[JollyRoger1516]

Sending captured ships home

Currently playing the privateer/trader interceptor/ individual ship fights role is a very tedious job as your hold + second ship hold is full after one or two traders and everybody hopes more for doubloons/upgrades then actual resources. This means people engaging in this role will constantly sail back and forth dropping of ships or loot rather then staying out and fighting.

After a successful boarding action, assigning crew and ending the fight allow us to send that captured ship with at least its minimum crew (min. crew counts are already available for all ships) but also its loaded cargo to the nearest owned port (or owned port of choice). The captured ship will spawn in the open world looking like any other AI ship (of the new nation) and sail to your nearest owned port. This will allow you to stay out much longer but also allow people to intercept/recapture these ships if caught in the open world. It will also be historically accurate as frigates that captured ships would send a small crew compliment to sail them back to their home ports.

If coding/server load allows maybe the ship should also retain its battle damage/crew count which would become obvious once drawn into battle.

If balancing demands a more permanent impact the total ship crew could lose a permanent 10% per ship sent home. This penalty only gets removed once docking in a port. This will make it a tactical choice as to how long you stay out and what types of ships you attack after the third ship is on its way home.

Edited April 27, 2020 by JollyRoger1516

[Eduard L'Aquila]

Lieutenants (Support NPCs)

Ships would have another 3 (or more, perhaps 6) upgrade slots that would be filled with NPCs that can be hired or trained to give bigger bonuses to the ship.

The 3 (or 6) roles would be Sailing (combat maneuvers), Gunnery (cannons), Boarding (boarding actions), Navigation (OW speed), Carpenter (repairs) and Surgeon (keeping the crew alive and morale).

They would "rank up" for only 5 levels:

Midshipman -> Ensign -> Second Lieutenant -> First Lieutenant -> Lieutenant Commander

Midshipman rank (with no bonuses) level up by taking part of the XP and Reals per activity, sailing XP, battle XP, trade Reals, contract sales. Midshipmen would start off with only requiring 1% XP / 1% Reals and Ensigns would have a small bonus and have a larger share (2%/2%), the other ranks would follow suit until 5%/5%. A ship with fully leveled Lieutenants would have a cost of 15% or 30% per activity, .

Lieutenants would be attached to a Captain, like the Captain's Chest so the NPCs are all saved if a ship goes down, to continue incurring payment to the Captain.

Lieutenants would be optional (and hired at midshipman rank at port or much more for a leveled up NPC) and a ship could sail without them (let's call them "Acting Midshipmen" if no NPC is designated) without their bonuses.

Peak bonuses would be the same as the specialized books/upgrades (Art of Sailing, Gunnery Encylopedia, Five Rings, Naval Clock, Naval Master Carpenters, and Surgeon's Tools)

I had originally posted this to the DLC proposals but it might fit better here.

[Malcolm3]

Strangely there were quite a lot suggestions on Crew gaining experience etc and no such proposal here.

Simple, but quite effective system for implementing Crew experience in game (expanding basic idea by @Sea Archer)

Reason

• Currently Crew is expendable and available in any numbers in any ports (even enemy ones). Only situation when Crew matters is in Battle instance (where if you are undercrewed you'll have problems) and sometimes in OW when you have no spare Crew.
• Meanwhile IRL it was the Crew quality that made difference between victory and defeat and determined the whole course of naval war - even with plenty of good ships you couldn't do most things without enough experinced seamen. The most know examples are wars (1739-1815) between Britain (with average ships but also large pool of able seamen) and France and Spain (better ships, but a way less able seamen to crew them).
• So the main limiting factor to fleet size (besides pure resources and money) was a amount of trained and experienced men needed to crew the ships - hence impressing sailors at sea from traders and foreign ships etc...

Principles and Mechanics

• Each player have Rank XP (from battles and sailing) and Crafting XP (from building ships) - let add to it also his Crew XP. That's the main idea.
• You gain some XP from each action you have (even if you lose it). Gained XP counts as XP gained also by you Crew (Crew XP). This XP assigned to your Crewmen.
• Only those Crewmen will get those XP that you have in the end of fight before leaving (if you get sunk or blew up as a Fireship and lose all your Crew, you won't get any Crew XP).
• Received XP added to your Crew XP and the amont added is defined by proportion between Crew survived the action and total Crew numbers before it (see example).
• Crew XP will have levels (just like Rank and Crafting) - currently I suggest 5 of them: Recruits, Landsmen, Seamen (no bonuses - standard crew), Able Seamen and Jack Tars.
• Low levels will get you negative modifiers (inexperienced Crew), higher levels - positive ones (veterans). Difference between lowest and highest levels should not exceed 10-12%. Also you will always have 40 crew (basic free crew) as standard base level (no bonuses).
• All crew you recruit in port are inexperienced men (they have no XP) and their including in your Veteran Crew will lower overall amount of Crew XP, probably also lowering Crew level (see example).
• There should be no difference between ships (just like with Knowledge slots) and anti-altfarming mechanic also shouls apply to this.

Example:

• Your are a Flag Captain, having 500 crew and your Crew level is 3500. You sailed out of port in your Trincomalee having 325 crew and engaged enemy AI Frigate. You won the battle gaining 250 XP and in the end you have only 280 crew.
• Then new total Crew XP is defined in following way: 3500 (basic XP) + (250 (gained XP) multiplied by (280 (surviving Crew) divided by 500 (basic total Crew))) = 3500 +  250*(280/500) = 3640.
• Next you returned to port and decide to replenish crew, recruiting the lost 45 men (with 0 XP). After that your ne total Crew XP defined again in following way : 3640 (initial XP) multiplied by (455 (initial crew) divided by 500 (crew after recruitment)) = 3640*(455/500) = 3312 XP (so even after victorious action you can lose a bit)

Effects

• More sense in using Rum for resurrecting Crew even in the end of Battle. Also splinter protection will have more purpose
• Surrender will also have much more sense now, as you are saving your veterans from certain death.
• If you lose hard fought battle (against superior numbers for example) you will gain some benefits from you skill and courage.
• Gaining XP when you are at highest rank will have sense.
• Less incentive in fireshipping, especially with 1st rates, cause you will lose too much crew.
• Probably less incentive for boarding actions with potentially heavy losses.
• Screening (if it stays) will probably changed from simply dying in DLC and capped ships and buying time to smth more sensible, cause you will need to save your crew for other day.
• Sailors Lifes Matters!

Main problem with introducing crew with experience and better stats - it can (and will) widen the gap between successful and usually victorious gankers players and the rest, especially noobs getting farmed at capitals etc. Just as in reality of 1792-1815  with experienced and veteran British crews against French and Spanish, not having enough sea training because of blockade (from which Brits gained their naval XP), therefore constantly losing.

Edited June 25, 2020 by Malcolm3

[admiralellis]

Weekly Trafalgar event. Lineup could be randomized equally, so we get a good mix of various ship types. The winning team may get a reward

[Farrago]

Rather than a new player receiving one Hercules note upon completion of the final exam, they receive a Hercules DLC which can be redeemed every 24 hours as a regular DLC but only for a period of one week.

Too often new players get the ship and are still not experienced enough to not lose it. Let them use it enough, really learn to sail it, and maybe even buy the DLC after their week is up.

Obviously this should not be retroactive for captains who have already passed the exams.

Edited July 1, 2020 by Farrago

[Ferrus Pugnum]

Add fleet escort missions for AI elite or non elite indiaman fleets (or other types like escorting nobles who are on a ship in the fleet) from one port to another.

These fleets would have a special flag to identify them and either rotate in ow or spawn through a mission.

The goal would be to escort the fleet to a specified port and the rewards for the group escorting would be based on how much of the fleet arrived intact.

Enroute the fleet would be open to attack by any enemy and possibly ai enemy ships it nears.

This would be in open world and not in a battle instance until a fight ensued.

This would create more PVP and PVE opportunities for all and would be available to all ranks as escorts no restrictions.

The only issue is the protection fleets that would have to ignore these missions to capitol areas.

[Cetric de Cornusiac]

Fleet ships have only limited usability, which could get augmented by a few additional orders you could give to them.

Here they are:

- "sail straight line to course XXX" (other than the retreat order, ship would still fire when coming across targets. This is good for luring away enemy, or for preparing multi-sided attacks, any maneuvering)

- "follow friendly ship A" (lets you build flotillas, pairs. Order can be combined with others given to ship A, so they retreat as pair or sail to course XXX as pair...)

- "try to board enemy ship B" (adds tactical options, other than just 'demast' or 'sink')

- "loot sunken ship C" (fleet ship will try to pick up loot from sunk ship you specified. Useful when you can't reach it yourself)

- "protect friendly ship D" (ship will act as escort for D and fight anyone shooting at it, or position itself into the line of fire to shield it)

- "strike colors" (ship will surrender. This is useful when you have hope to conquer it back later, this can prevent getting it sunk. Question remains if your former ship should join enemy side and fight for them, or like now just become neutral with zero crew)

However, this proposal seems rather heavy on programming efforts needed.

[Spacedog]

Proposal.

Not even a whole feature, I imagine that is a single line of code to change. 

When you are in battle with friendly AI, and are boarding an enemy, they will fire into both of you.

Make the friendly AI stop firing into mates if they are boarding. Simply change it so AI doesnt target enemies that are being boarded (at least not with round shot).

Nothing worse in battle than having friendly AI kill you during boarding.

[Hethwill]

Wind / Manoeuvres / Ship rigging / Leeshore / Manual sailing

• A deep review of amount of sail open to wind in relation to angle to wind
• in Slow or Battle, for example, it would be less exposed to contrary winds beyond 90º - 65º. At Full the wind force would be the same from both sides at max angle of attack, 65º example, making it much more difficult to go through the eye of the wind ( if at all possible ) at full sail but very possible and controlled to do so at fighting sail.
• Also a fine increase on the lee effect. On the ship as a whole ( beware the leeshore ) and the bow being turned/pushed downwind ( it does change course ). Wherever possible a captain should be able to counter act the effect by manual rigging control unless angle of attack ( sails to wind ) is just beyond the envelope ( some ships are 70, others can go up to 45 ) and it is up to captain skill.
• This would affect all rigging types with no benefit, prejudice to any.
• A very authentic period tactical choice between wearing and changing tack through the wind.

Edited May 29, 2020 by Hethwill

[mikawa]

• Make Fog appear in Combats. Someone can retreat, someone can suddenly appear and attack, you never know exactly where you opponent is, nor if he attacks within the next moment.

[mikawa]

• make an event only for ships up to briggs