My Christmas-wishlist for Naval Action

[Liq]

Christmas is near.. so I've been working on a little wishlist regarding changes / features I'd like to see in Naval Action..

Just a little brainstorm - I've stolen some suggestions I liked  Feel free to discuss

Dear Santa

I have tried to be a good boy this year and sank as many pira... emm... BANDITS as possible =) In return I would like to present you my wishlist for this years christmas

• Buy-Contracts for ships, pretty much self-explaining
• Nerf or remove current PvP reward modules, add paints instead (even if they are only 1 dura; I'm sure it would be a much appreciated feature - I know for a fact there have been some 1 dura paints given out for "testing")
• Leave the safezone's size untouched BUT make it so only players up to and including Flag Captain (650 Crew rank) get to enjoy it - IMHO a more experienced player should not experience a safezone in a pvp mmo game - That way a player can still try out a ship of the line, 3rd rate or bellona, while being completely safe
• Allow clans to "hire" up to a certain amount (e.g. 5) of players from different nations and invite them to battle groups, and join their Port Battles 
• ... Nerf the Wasa
• "Disguised Perk" which hides your name for enemy nations until you are in battle - Players of your nation can still see your name though
• Remove most of the speed modules - Before the big wipe we only had Copper Plating and Speed Trim (-10% HP), and it worked out perfectly fine. Let wood be the deciding factor.
• Introduce an exponential reward curve for PvP - a 10v1 should not be nearly as rewarding as a 1v1 - Limit it to 200% rewards (maybe for 1v3) to avoid exploits
• Slightly buff Carronades
• Limit chain shot
• Introduce Control Perk as a default mechanic for every battle
• Make the santa cecilia more accessible  
• Let players vote for a Commander at the beginning of a battle - The commander can then draw stuff on the map (M), e.g. the general direction, focussed target, or whatever - Useful for bigger battles (especially port battles)

 

 

Edited December 2, 2017 by Liq

[Guest]

Thanks for this nice summation, Liq. I completely agree with your list

[Landsman]

6 minutes ago, Liq said:

Leave the safezone's size untouched BUT make it so only players up to and including Flag Captain (650 Crew rank) get to enjoy it

This seems like a no-brainer. The purpose of the safezone's should be to give new and less experienced players some space to get into the game and not turn the alleged PvP server into another PvE server. The current implementation without any real reason to leave the zone even as max rank player is absolutely ridiculous and is only making the OW even more dead / empty...

[Anolytic]

I thought for sure your wishlist was going to have on the top 1 more set of Forged Papers.

Edited December 2, 2017 by Anolytic

[Guest]

Liq stated it well. That is the best wish list I could imagine as well. Good job Liq......except the killing the Pira...uh, I mean Bandit part. o7

[Anolytic]

21 minutes ago, Liq said:

"Disguised Perk" which hides your name for enemy nations until you are in battle - Players of your nation can still see your name though

I guess it can be hard to be one of the most notorious players on the server.

24 minutes ago, Liq said:

Buy-Contracts for ships, pretty much self-explaining

This was the first thing I felt was missing after the introduction of single durabilities and I've suggested it myself a couple of times.

27 minutes ago, Liq said:

• ... Nerf the Wasa

I think (hope) they are working on it with the rebalancing of ships. The speed/stability should be decreased and the BR should be increased in relation to the other 4th rates.

28 minutes ago, Liq said:

Allow clans to "hire" up to a certain amount (e.g. 5) of players from different nations and invite them to battle groups, and join their Port Battles 

Or just simply cross-nation clan alliances would be great.

30 minutes ago, Liq said:

• Introduce Control Perk as a default mechanic for every battle

+1

31 minutes ago, Liq said:

Let players vote for a Commander at the beginning of a battle - The commander can then draw stuff on the map (M), e.g. the general direction, focussed target, or whatever - Useful for bigger battles (especially port battles

I don't see the need. I like that there is no "official" commanders in-game and also that communication is valuable. I think making it too technical and complicated, or with too many aids just make the battles more mechanical, generic and boring. Total War-games have naval battles now, so if I want to order AI ships around on a map I play Empire Total War.

[Major General La Fayette]

38 minutes ago, Liq said:

Dear Santa

You mean "Dear Santi" ?

[Niels Terkildsen]

I agree on all your points, very nice list. Except perhaps:

47 minutes ago, Liq said:

• Slightly buff Carronades
• Limit chain shot

It seems like that would upset the balance between using chain vs. using ball (demasting) to cripple ships - even further one might say.

I do agree, however, that carronade penetration is horrendous on hull (the same applies to 12-pounder longs/mediums and below when targetting larger ships); however, I wouldn't solve it by buffing carronades. Instead I would lower thickness slightly across the board, both for masts and hull, while at the same time increasing HP.

Furthermore, I would make it a little bit harder to hit masts: I think masts should have areas where balls would bounce off, or alternatively (easier to implement I suppose) make the hitboxes slightly smaller. The reason for this is simple: think of it like hitting a hull from an angle and the ball bouncing off, the same would apply to hitting a mast (due to its round shape); to get a clean, damaging hit, you'd have to hit it almost centre on. (If someone knows of any tests or physics that say the contrary, feel free to correct me).

[Christendom]

you forgot the most important of all.....#servermerge.

+1 on the removal of speed mods.  

Edited December 2, 2017 by Christendom

[Corona Lisa]

Dear Santa,

remove PvE from NAL.

Edited December 2, 2017 by Jon Snow lets go

[Stepp636]

+ Bring back signaling perk.

[NavalActionPlayer]

Allow clans to "hire" up to a certain amount (e.g. 5) of players from different nations outside of the clan and invite them to battle groups, and join their Port Battles. In other words, they can be from any other clan or none or any nation.

[Niels Terkildsen]

1 hour ago, Liq said:

• Limit chain shot

Why not limit all types of shot? Simply make ammo something you have to carry (adding weight to your ship), perhaps with a max amount in total based on your ship size, and you'd be able to fill it up with whatever types you want.

Perhaps even powder as an item you have to carry could be introduced, and you'd be able to freely choose to lower or increase your charge at the cost of more/less powder (but giving you the option to potentially penetrate better) - of course using extra powder charge for too long should have a risk of losing cannons (or perhaps just increase reload time to simulate the need to let the cannons cool), and conversely using too little powder will lower penetration (but perhaps increase crew casualties the closer you match velocity to the point of penetration?).

[pietjenoob]

History-log of the Ship

Ability to improve defenses against more upkeep

A proper Dutch ship, preferably the Fluit, Prince Maurits-class or the Wreker-class 80/90 gun.

A new UI

Storm battles back again

[Salty Sails]

Bring back 2400 players... and LV!

[HachiRoku]

Dont chat ban hachi as much

If you limit chain I expect repairs to be limited 

Duel rooms

Small battle rooms 

 

Edited December 2, 2017 by HachiRoku

[Wojtek]

In my opinion, resetting the perks should not cost combat marks, you could then change them more often and match to the current situation.

[Guest]

/ Signed, but nerf the accuracy on the cannons and limit all ammunitions.

[King of Crowns]

my naval action Christmas list        

 SERVER MERGE. with timer zones in areas of the map or 4 hour assult timers controlled by the clans in control of the port. global has 50 players currently. EU has 276.  this is 30 mins before reset. pls merge the servers so we can play the game. 

[Hethwill, the Red Duke]

I wish to return to 10.x OW experience.

[Nelsons Barrel]

1 hour ago, Hethwill said:

I wish to return to 10.x OW experience.

The time were you farmed pve-players so much that playernumbers went from 1200 active players on EU to 600 in no time? Great times...

[Liq]

20 hours ago, Niels Terkildsen said:

Why not limit all types of shot? Simply make ammo something you have to carry (adding weight to your ship), perhaps with a max amount in total based on your ship size, and you'd be able to fill it up with whatever types you want.

At first it sounds like a great addition - But Admin mentionned somewhere that this feature, ammo, was added to POTBS, and just became a tedious time waste after a time 

But it might be worth testing, when we still got the chance to in the Early Access Alpha stage.

Perhaps even powder as an item you have to carry could be introduced, and you'd be able to freely choose to lower or increase your charge at the cost of more/less powder (but giving you the option to potentially penetrate better) - of course using extra powder charge for too long should have a risk of losing cannons (or perhaps just increase reload time to simulate the need to let the cannons cool), and conversely using too little powder will lower penetration (but perhaps increase crew casualties the closer you match velocity to the point of penetration?).

I'm liking this part.

Edited December 3, 2017 by Liq

[Niels Terkildsen]

On 3/12/2017 at 4:06 PM, Liq said:

At first it sounds like a great addition - But Admin mentionned somewhere that this feature, ammo, was added to POTBS, and just became a tedious time waste after a time 

But it might be worth testing, when we still got the chance to in the Early Access Alpha stage.

I played PotBS myself, and I don't recall experiencing ammo as a bad thing. I mean, if that's an issue, why not just leave out the commodity part and have a setup that you can alter in port. For example (slightly arbitrary numbers): you can have 1000 ammo at most, and you choose to bring 800 ball, 100 chain, and 100 grape, or you can customise that however you want within the max limit.

Obviously this may be detrimental to longer journeys where you can't go into friendly ports and auto-resupply.

I don't know, it's a complicated thing to alter since it will affect so many variables.

 

The possibility of running out of ammo reminded me of an anecdote about Tordenskjold (Danish naval hero):

In July 1714, Peder Wessel (later sired "Tordenskjold") was sailing the frigate Løvendals Galley (18 guns) in Skagerak (using the Dutch flag to deceive potential prizes), and he met another frigate flying the British flag, but after passing by Wessel's ship, it fired two shots and let fly the Swedish flag; it was in fact the Swedish frigate De Olbing Galley (28 guns) under a Captain Bactman. Then Wessel hoisted the Danish flag and they commenced fighting. They fought for more than three hours before Bactman retired; but Wessel pursued, after repairing some of the damage. They fought again for about two hours, until midnight, both ships now being very much damaged, and Bactman crippled so he couldn't run.

After another pause during the night, they commenced fighting again the following morning, for about three hours, and once again they separated to repair in order to stay afloat. Then, for a fourth time, they engaged and after an hour, when Bactman was apparently almost about to surrender, Wessel realised he had run out of powder. He was unable to board due to rather heavy weather, so he had no other option than to let the Swede go. 

He did not want the Swedes to think he was running, so he lowered a boat with a trumpeter that sailed across to the Swedish frigate to offer Bactman a glass of wine on board Wessel's ship, but he refused. The trumpeter saw the carnage on board the frigate, and reported it to Wessel when coming back. Wessel then took the speaking-trumpet and asked Bactman whether he could borrow some powder so they could continue fighting, but Bactman answered that he only just had enough for himself. 

Then the ships approached one another and the two captains brought out a toast to each other, asking to give their best to friends in Copenhagen and Gothenburg respectively, whereafter they threw their glasses overboard; the crews then giving three cheers, and the ships separating.

Wessel was later court martialed (but acquitted) for endangering the King's ship by fighting against a much stronger enemy, and also revealing that he was out of ammunition, which could be considered important military information, etc. Among other things, he defended himself by saying, "I did ask my opponent whether he would lend me some powder - that he wouldn't - so that was it, until God desires that we find each other again".

 

A romanticised depiction of the event by Otto Mølsted (1862-1930):

 

Edited December 6, 2017 by Niels Terkildsen

[Quineloe]

What's the issue with chain shot? You can't really wear someone below 55% with it, and it is far less accurate than round shot?

[Aster]

How about having ammo as a item like rig/hull reps, so chain grape ball all being their own thing.