Bottle neck in the progression tree

[Lisa-Azra]

UPDATE I have reached 1st Lieutenant rank. I am no longer allowed to hire cutters to help missions. I do not belong to a group and there are two opponents in each mission battle so unable to complete missions.

GAME OVER

 

 

 

 

 

Being a one week old sailor and already very near the rank of 1st lieutenant I am beginning to see a possible worrying trend. As everyone, I started on a cutter, I joined random battles to the delight or disgust of players already involved (this option has been removed by the latest patch). I gained gold and xp. My mission opponent rank increased and with crafting I was not forced but strongly directed to build and sail bigger ships, multi mask square riggers. I see less and less cutters and more and more brigs and snows. If this continues everyone will be sailing rank 1 victories or the similar and all those nice boats will be defunct and that will be a great shame.

I love sailing the cutter, it is fast and nimble and it is not about gun number and calibre size. I would imagine many will have their favourites and although I can still use it in missions it is becoming outmatched. I know the answer is to fleet up but should the game just be for gangs?

One possible solution is to make missions selected on the boat rank rather than officer rank, and like the current system flexibility in fighting the next rank above and below but not where you can attack a 7 rank boat with a class 1 battleship. This will allow players to gain xp. officer rank and keep the wonderful variety of boats alive. This has the additional advantage to keep a number of different class vessels in your dock and fight in wider range of battles utilising. Boats of too high rank are prohibited from joining so mixed fleet battles will be associated with the heavy punchers. 

Edited February 6, 2016 by Lisa-Azra