Patch 14: Part 2 experimental patch increasing realism in ship behavior

[Iroquois Confederacy]

4 minutes ago, Quineloe said:

That is not my experience. At the Sweden vs BF battle at Higuain I scored 2 kills and 4 assists on First and Second Rates and I walked away with a mere 13 PVP marks.

30 PVP average per player marks is impossible because not a single ship is worth 30 marks. If you made 30 marks in a battle,  everyone else on your team made next to nothing.  Every time a first rate sinks, it's 75 to 77 PVP marks destroyed.

But you didn't answer my question: do you have hundreds of PVP marks just sitting around? From what I know, even the very best PVPers with us have earned a few hundred PVP marks in *total*. and they want to use that stuff for themselves, too.

There has been some shifts in how many marks are awarded for each kill since I last played.  I had about 125ish when they were done away with last time, over the course of a... six week career?  Would likely translate to about 400 now, which, I would personally use for myself, as you say.

[Christoph]

1st rate costs 100 PvP marks, then you should also get 100 for the sank ship

[Quineloe]

12 hours ago, Serk said:

I like the idea of hard to get 1rst rate, but I'm not sure about the timing. I think @admin could have waited until the 3 new 3rd rates are launched and become the backbone of RVR fleets.

Meanwhile, maybe keep Wasa as a combat mark ship, as she is the best way for nations without CM to challenge those  at the top?

 

Any ETA on those new 3rd rates? Must be a few months still.

Why would you think new 3rd rates would replace first rates as the RVR backbone?

3rd rates are not maneuverable enough to outmaneuver organized 1st rate fleets. They however have significantly less firepower (32 vs 42pd gun deck and usually 2-3 heavy guns fewer), significantly less crew (650 vs 850 to 1100, relevant for boarding brawling), significantly weaker masts  (131cm vs 144cm), significantly weaker armor (e.g. 7400/73 vs 9200/80)
in a brawl, a first rate puts a third rate into reload shock using regular ball shot. The third rate in return will deal maybe 20%.

Either New third rates suffer the Wasa disease and become ridiculously OP for their rate / BR, or they're balanced compared to the Bellona, and therefore will be irrelevant for PBs.

The Wasa already doesn't counter first rates, even though it has a very wonky power to BR ratio. For a start, it has even thinner masts (122cm) and very thin armor (compared to first rates) at 6500/68. A Bellona already gets shredded by a first rate broadside, a Wasa doesn't stand a chance. The Wasa is lolop because 6500/68 is incredibly strong vs 18pd cannon.  But 42pd are an entirely different matter.  A first rate will just take off the top masts of a Wasa and then eat it up close. one by one.

The only way to make first rates truly rare that I can see with the current tools is by using the BR mechanic for PB Limits even more. First Rates 800 BR, Second Rates 500 BR, third rates 300 BR. A 25 third rate fleet would come in at 7500 BR, so on a 9600 BR port, you'd have 2100 BR left to upgrade from Third Rates. Do we bring 10 second rates, 15 third rates? how about 3 first rates, two second rates, 20 third rates? Options, options. And it would free up a lot of economy power to build more frigates for random OW PVP.

[OneEyedSnake]

13 minutes ago, Quineloe said:

That is not my experience. At the Sweden vs BF battle at Higuain I scored 2 kills and 4 assists on First and Second Rates and I walked away with a mere 13 PVP marks.

30 PVP average per player marks is impossible because not a single ship is worth 30 marks. If you made 30 marks in a battle,  everyone else on your team made next to nothing.  Every time a first rate sinks, it's 75 to 77 PVP marks destroyed.

But you didn't answer my question: do you have hundreds of PVP marks just sitting around? From what I know, even the very best PVPers with us have earned a few hundred PVP marks in *total*. and they want to use that stuff for themselves, too.

yes, im not like you apparently. and most that I know apparently are not either. I said a mid sized pvp battle. Perhaps your nation can help your aim, i do not know your problem. I do not have this problem. I got 18 pvp marks with 3 trader ships sunk. 

[Quineloe]

8 minutes ago, OneEyedSnake said:

yes, im not like you apparently. and most that I know apparently are not either. I said a mid sized pvp battle. Perhaps your nation can help your aim, i do not know your problem. I do not have this problem. I got 18 pvp marks with 3 trader ships sunk. 

cool, we can go out all ad hominem if you don't actually want to argue with real numbers as the game uses them. What part of "2 kills" did you not understand? Those were mostly Bucentaures. I think I can aim, otherwise I wouldn't have gotten those kill credits. BTW, Captain Reverse also only got 15 PVP marks in that battle, and with 1/5 he was one of the best players on the team.

Can you define what a mid sized PVP battle is, please use total BR as the value.

Please don't pretend all players can just start to generate enough PVP marks to create first rate fleets. They wouldn't go for 200k a piece if that were even remotely true.

Edited December 23, 2017 by Quineloe

[Quineloe]

8 hours ago, HachiRoku said:

we dont have months  I would give the 3rd rate better guns, make her a bellona clone as she is and just have 2 different colored ships. Then we have 3 3rd rates. Wasa, bellona and 3rd rate. 

A lot of the issues come from the linear increments of penetration as you go up in shot size. If a 42pd only had 2-3cm more penetration than the 32pd as opposed to the 10cm it actually does have, this whole caste system for ships would disappear fairly quickly.

At 250m, a 42pd still has 125 cm of penetration. That's what more than what a 24pd has point blank. An 18pd shot only has 109cm penetration at point blank? What? Given you can have a 100cm armor first rate with the new Naval structure refit, you can have a first rate that is almost *immune* to 18pd long cannons at any range (since you never really have that perfect 90° hit anyways)
If any lineship had been immune to guns 18pd and smaller, they would not have fitted so many small guns on these ships in the first place. As I already posted before, that 10cm penetration advantage (on top of the 7cm armor advantage on first rates) is the reason 3rd rates are a non-factor in PBs.

I don't know it for certain, but I don't think this is realistic at all on top of the whole thing.

[Quineloe]

7 hours ago, Seraphic Radiance said:

Yep , and also zerg who always wins will steam roll through everything in the best ships soon enough and that my friend is the sharp nail that is waiting to strike. 

Potbs had the same problem. French one time became so strong that they would take 1st rates to pvp on daily basis and no one else could afford to beat them. Potbs they had instaspike mechanics where you could sink a 1st rate in 1 sec and that balanced many things.

 

I will now cast the magic spell "jugular" on that Invincible first rate, turning it from a heavily armored tank into a paper ship that takes bonus damage on every hit!

And now I will cast the magic spell Thundering Broadside, to prevent the player in the Invincible from casting any defensive spells that will counter the now upcoming instant damage spike that will destroy a completely undamaged ship in the blink of an eye at a distance of 500 yards!

Now everyone else casts the magic spell Ultima Ratio Regum,  which will make our cannonballs deal twice the actual damage, completely obliterating the DR mechanic that the FLS Devs had spent so much time to fine tune and balance.

Oh no, he survived with 1 structure because he did get off the magic spell Last Stand, and that 1 structure is now immune to damage for 75 seconds! Oh no, he cast another magic spell, Invincibility! Now we cannot hit him at all for another 30 seconds as he starts repairing with carpenter, admirals overhaul and emergency repairs! Oh look, it's three minutes later, and his ship is FULLY REPAIRED!

What a shit show that game was, lol.

[Quineloe]

8 hours ago, Wraith said:

Two speed fit 4ths and a thickness fit 2nd can take out a 1st via stern raking and capping though (and that's with the 1st being both a quality 1st rate sailor and board fit). So, balanced?

That's 950 BR vs 600 BR. Not exactly a relevant scenario for RVR. Where's the other second rate assisting the first rate?

[Quineloe]

5 hours ago, Hethwill said:

Given US hours, I guess you'll see more at US hours  not at EU time.

It's 9PM EST now, numbers have dropped to 240. Where are your US players?

Meanwhile, let me share this random March 2016 screenshot (ie late enough after EA launch that all the random steam people who had no interest in a game with these combat mechanics have already left). 19:58 CET.

[Niagara]

14 hours ago, admin said:

Update was deployed today 22 Dec.

• Labor hours contracts can now be bought for combat marks
• Victory marks can be bought for PvP marks to promote both RVR and PVP activites
• Prices for ship notes for PvP marks updated and generally lowered.
• Wasa and L' Hermione have been moved to PVP rewards and prices were updated
• Ability to acquire wasa on a pve server will be added next week together with the removal of permits for majority of vessels on both servers.
  • permits will remain for first rates and second rates
• Distribution of victory marks changed
  • victory marks will be given to top 3 positions on the conquest weekly leaderboard
    • 3 marks for first place
    • 2 marks for second place
    • 1 marks for third place
  • victory marks will only be given to the players who:
    • Have at least one lord protector status in at least one port by the end of the round - bringing his nation a control point or,
    • Participated in a successful port battle during the conquest round (even if the port was lost later on) - bringing his nation a battle point

 

Okies. So, to get access to Victory Marks to craft first rate you need to do PvP, Or seriously grind stuff and buy it from others doing PvP.

You dont get any VM for screening or crafting or trading or all the other stuff that aids the nation. Its just the players with ships in a PB that gets them if your nation is top 3...

There are few a flaws here.

• This will be forcing players to either do PvP to gain PvP marks for conversion or pay insane amounts to buy it from others doing PvP.
• You are NOT rewarding all players helping in RvR but just a select group that manages to do PB and not the crafters, traders etc
• You are removing a large portion of content from players who do not do as you think that they should play the game.
• You are also not changing the way people do pvp, you are encouraging ganks over fair fight as people will need to grind PvP marks.
• It will in some ways be better to fight a empty PB over one in which you find a fair fight as you need to do atleast 1 PB to gain that elusive VM

 

I don't know how this will work out and if more will play or leave.

I think that when faced with changes most will react negatively as you know what you have now and are unsure about the future after the changes and thus tends to view change as bad.

What I can say is that for me personally, being forced to do something to gain access to late game content is not what I look for in a game. You can lure me or entice me to grind stuff but to state that either you do this or not at all is not a good way to communicate with your playerbase and customers.

I understand that I play on a PvP server, I choose to play on a PvP server. I understand that there will be PvP related content and I dont mind to do PvP/RvR but I do not care for the ganking, the toxic atmosphere it creates and the lack of understanding from certain players that not everyone wants to play the game like they play it.

Some of the other players actually like to do trading, Craft ships for others, supply the nation with the coal needed to build cannons for the ships PvP players sail in, yet many PvP players tend to look down on those who do that boring stuff and write Carebear and think they somehow should have larger say in how the game is run/designed over a PvE player.

Lets face it. Even if only a 1000 players log in each day not all of them bother to post there opinions here or in Global/Nation so they are the silent majority most of the time. 

The facts are...

The more players the better the game for everyone

• More players = More chances for PvP.
• More players = More players crafting ships
• More players = More traders supplying the crafters or doing money trading runs
• More players = More PvE grinding
• More players = Bigger chance of finding cool persons to play with and increase the fun.

 

Some of the changes will make it harder for the casual players to enjoy end game content. For those with much spare time spent in the game they can grind the PvP marks if they can find players to gank with and victims to gank. Or if your part of the top 3-5 nations in RvR and manage to to a PB.

For I do not see any change that promotes Open World PvP or more balanced fights, but rather more ganks as you need to grind PvP marks that is needed as more stuff is behind a PvP mark paywall.

 

 

 

 

 

[Capn Rocko]

1 hour ago, Quineloe said:

That is not my experience. At the Sweden vs BF battle at Higuain I scored 2 kills and 4 assists on First and Second Rates and I walked away with a mere 13 PVP marks.

That's because you fight in big groups. If you were the only person to shoot at those ships, you would have gotten 50+ marks. Its not hard to amass PvP marks. You just have to be willing to fight alone or in very small groups. For some people that is a very hard thing to do..

[Jesters-Ink]

1 hour ago, Christoph said:

1st rate costs 100 PvP marks, then you should also get 100 for the sank ship

Better economy to cap and keep the first rate than sink it, under the current system.

Plus you get the upgrades too.

[Capn Rocko]

1 hour ago, Christoph said:

1st rate costs 100 PvP marks, then you should also get 100 for the sank ship

1st rates are free with epic event. Talk about a good way to make money and help lesser-privileged players.. 

[Sir Texas Sir]

3 hours ago, Quineloe said:

is the information on which port is worth 3 points even accessible in the game...

I'm wondering what the other ports are cause this was the list of the old ones.  That isn't 13 and I think its actually 9 cause Nouvelle Orlenas and Vera Cruz can't be captured.  @admin can we maybe get an updated list of which ports you are talking about?

 

All regions give 1 conquest marks. Some give more.
Capitals of the regions your governments demand to bring under control of your nations and will provide additional benefits for them:

1. Santo Domingo
2. Cartagena de Indias
3. San Juan
4. Port Au Prince
5. San Iago
6. Morgan bluff
7. Vera Cruz
8. Campeche
9. Nouvelle Orleans
10. Bridge town
11. Road Town

[victor]

6 hours ago, Seraphic Radiance said:

You know the answer. 

They wrote it that clear only in a post not more than a couple of week ago. So basically after testers paid.

Fact is this game desperately needs a balanced development, not white knights that support devs in every thing they do just because "it's their game".

If you take money for a project, you had better listening to people who gave you money. Especially if they are the customers of the product.

Else, the next project you will not get funded, simple.

Edited December 23, 2017 by victor

[Casanova Moderne]

On 22.12.2017 at 12:31 AM, John Sheppard said:

1st of all DON"T YOU DARE TO ERASE THIS.. we are pissed and we have a right to be..

ok .. WHAT THE F@CK?? do you have any idea what's going on at the momment in the game??? "WE NEED TO FORCE PLAYERS TO RVR"???? do you know that a lot of people are soooo damn fed up with 3 port battles every F day that they actually said ENOUGH??? and now you want to force them to do RVR? well let me tell you something .. you will only force them to LEAVE this f@cked up game.. 

and about all this "maybe the old players aren't interested in RVR but new players will do it" bullsht .. this is hilarious .. we have so many examples of what happens when 20 newbies try to fight 10-12 1+ year old players .. it always ends up a disaster for the newbies and pls don't say "they will learn" coz continuously getting their ass kicked does not make them learn .. i've seen it all too many times 

you see that 95% of the replies here say that you've screwed up .. well you HAVE to do what we want .. you can't do what YOU want coz we pay the money so tell the guys at dev to shove this update in someone else's throat .. we don't care otherwise they can keep paying for empty servers and we'll make sure to spread the word how much this game sucks that you won't see any money from now on

Edit : this may be seem too harsh responce but we as customers have every right to be angry about you going totally against our wishes

Hello admin,

the guy has formalized it harsh, but all in all, it's true. So give us back the possibility to convert victory marks again! And not this 100 PvP to one victory mark nonsense.  Put it like it was before. Not everyone is a top player. And think about players who are not that skilled!

Edited December 23, 2017 by Casanova Moderne

[victor]

@admin if I understood correctly, from next week patch:

1) only 1st and 2nd rate ships will need permit to be crafted; and

2) permits to craft 1st and 2nd rate ships will be obtainable by means of Victory mark only.

Is it correct?

[Donjuan Dimarco]

Dear Devs,

think of your random players.

Cheers Don

[Quineloe]

7 hours ago, Capn Rocko said:

That's because you fight in big groups. If you were the only person to shoot at those ships, you would have gotten 50+ marks. Its not hard to amass PvP marks. You just have to be willing to fight alone or in very small groups. For some people that is a very hard thing to do..

No, if I had been the only person to shoot these ships, I would have just gotten sunk. Getting 50 marks means two first rates sunk all by yourself.

How about you post a screenshot of your 50 PVP mark victories before you claim this is possible?

[Quineloe]

6 hours ago, Capn Rocko said:

1st rates are free with epic event. Talk about a good way to make money and help lesser-privileged players.. 

required ship to enter epic event: first rate.

[Anolytic]

Just now, Quineloe said:

required ship to enter epic event: first rate.

Also required:

2 hours to find an epic event, 30 minutes to sail your 1st rates there, 90 minutes to finish the epic event, and 30 minutes sailing back.

[Quineloe]

9 minutes ago, victor said:

@admin if I understood correctly, from next week patch:

1) only 1st and 2nd rate ships will need permit to be crafted; and

2) permits to craft 1st and 2nd rate ships will be obtainable by means of Victory mark only.

Is it correct?

1) is literally what it says in the patch notes. Literally

2) nowhere it is said that victory marks are required for 2nd rates.

 

Why would 2nd rates and 1st rates both require a victory mark? no one would ever build second rates ever again.

[Quineloe]

1 minute ago, Anolytic said:

Also required:

2 hours to find an epic event, 30 minutes to sail your 1st rates there, 90 minutes to finish the epic event, and 30 minutes sailing back.

and five others who want to take part in this insanity. That's basically why we are not doing them anymore, never six players online who would want to do this long PVE dragon raid.

[Quineloe]

So 3 victory marks per week for top dog? that's 300 PVP marks per week. That is quite the golden shower of PVP marks you're giving out there, admin. Maybe 100 to 1 is not the proper exchange course for VM given how much harder it is to obtain PVP marks than combat marks.

How many players in your game managed to obtain 300 PVP marks in a single week? Is it zero? I'd like to know if anyone ever managed to get 300 PVP marks in a single week.

if Sweden stays on top for another 3-4 weeks, we'll have no idea what to do with all those VMs. And if someone else gets to #1, they'll have no idea what to do with all those VMs after a few weeks. Especially with Alt accounts also getting the x3 reward. I guarantee you that we'll start seeing alt accounts in predetermined port battles to get that one Lord Protector on alts for more VM showers.

 

[victor]

47 minutes ago, Quineloe said:

1) is literally what it says in the patch notes. Literally

2) nowhere it is said that victory marks are required for 2nd rates.

 

Why would 2nd rates and 1st rates both require a victory mark? no one would ever build second rates ever again.

Can you please drop your "ueber alles" attitude for a second and:

1) avoid treating other people as if they can't read? (you know better than me that devs are not so let's say ... very reliable ... in their statements about future patches, in particular in presence of a shitstorm of critics in the forum)

2) try to admit that could exist also views different from yours that are grounded on some kind of reasoning? (as far as 2nd rates are concerned, in fact, it would make no sense at all also keeping the permits for crafting just 1st and 2nd rates but then requesting combat marks for the permits of second rates and victory/pvp marks for first rates)

3) try to imagine that second rates could be useful in some situations even if you don't use them?

4) Finally, and in general - at least when you answer for someone else (not being requested to) - don't do it in a rude manner?

Edited December 23, 2017 by victor