Lack of benefit in surrendering

[Liq]

With the recent crafting changes there are now a few exceptional ships out there. Problem is, in most PvP engagements, players (ships) tend to sink more than surrender or end up captured. This results in less PvP equipped ships on the market and thus a higher price for decent ships and less PvP overall.

At the moment there is no real benefit in surrendering. You end up losing the ship anyway and crew only costs a couple k to re-hire.

If there was some sort of benefit in surrendering, and people surrendered more, the enemy could still decide wheter the ship should be sank for marks or kept because its well equipped and could be used again / sold. To my knowledge it was very rare that a ship was sunk rather than captured. But ingame you just dont always have time to board individual ships in the heat of an engagement, if you wanted to keep it.

I am not sure what that benefit in surrendering could be. At first I thought about something along the lines of getting some of the equipper mods / guns back as redeemables, but then quickly came to realize the exploitability.

Perhaps it's not surrendering that should be rewarded, but sinking that should be punished, be it with a gold fine or negative XP. That way people would probably prefer surrendering.

If this was going to be added, fleet perk 1 should be default IMO. Noone uses fleetships for PvP anyway, its sole purpose is to be able to capture a ship. We shouldnt need a perk for that IMO. (Same goes for prepared perk. Doed not make sense at all for the guns to not be loaded when entering an engagement.)

Share your thoughts and possible benefits on surrendering / penalties on sinking.

[von Beckett]

Yeah, this question has plagued me as well. I for one don't see any possible way to promote surrendering over fighting to the death, and I think that's pretty much how it will have to stay. There's a point where gameplay and fun should take a front seat, and this has to be one of those issues. People want to see "Naval Action!" With the wood splinters, explosions, shouting and of course, sinking, and not peppering the enemy ship with cannonfire for a bit and then seeing her surrender after 3 minutes.

[The Wren]

Koltes did a whole write up last summer about surrendering with honor which would make the act of surrendering a viable option for the two captains involved. 

I'm not very search engine savvy but I'm sure that someone can locate it and link it here.

[blubasso]

Ppl has no advantages to surrend, besides keeping their men. Too few to make it more attractive IMO.

If we wish someone to surrend we could introduce a morale check, say, when the total amount of your men is less than 50-75%—-> morale check——> if failed, automaticly the ship surrends. Players can keep their men and, say, 25% of total amount of goods on board calculated also with cannons, rum and so on. I know it’s not realistic at all, but this is a game. Percentage of morale check should be very low in the Navy and it raises with merchant ships, for exemple: at 50% of men lost a navy ship makes a morale check (2% surrending); at 75% of men lost it raises at 8-10%; in merchant ships, morale check should be 10% and 25% (just one morale check each). To add a little reality, the player could play a little game to regain the ship control, if failed, the ship surrends.

This could be a possible solution to the problem, if we really are interested to this.

Edited February 6, 2018 by blubasso

[Cabral]

 I already gave an idea in Sugestions topics about how crews could surrender more easily, was about Crew Morale during sea battle. A visual Morale bar that could decrease with reload shocks suffered and could increase after inflicting reload shock on the enemy. 3 broadsides from a Santi to a Surprise it's equal a 3 reload shocks, in RL the Surprise crew would raise the white flag after such punishment.

[Landsman]

2 hours ago, Liq said:

Same goes for prepared perk. Doed not make sense at all for the guns to not be loaded when entering an engagement.

I never thought of it like this but yeah, this perk isn't really worth a slot and at the same time it seems silly that you start loading your guns when the battle already started....

[Sir Lancelot Holland]

The instrument of striking the colours and surrendering a ship was considered to be an act of honour, an instrument by which a Captain could end a fight and save the lives of his men who would have fought hard and probably for several hours, sometimes there would be little hope of saving their ship, or the crew so depleted that there was no point in fighting on. During the Napoleonic wars Captains and crews would be Paroled even exchanged on their word of honour.

It should also be remembered that under the Prize system every man on every ship that fought in battle was entitled to  a share of the Admiralty Courts pay out for captured vessels and their cargo's, this was the value of forcing a surrender as opposed to sinking a vessel, the only real difference between a Naval Captain, a Privateer or a Pirate was that Pirates never had to give away profit to the Admiralty Courts! The Prize or shares were decided by agreement of the Captain and crew ( although some Captains like Edward Teach would skim off as much as they could).

To make surrender viable the Prize money had to be worth the effort, some Captains made a good deal of money, and sometimes even some of the crew made enough to buy that 'little public house' ashore if they lived long enough and had a successful Captain.

[Sir Lancelot Holland]

2 hours ago, Landsman said:

I never thought of it like this but yeah, this perk isn't really worth a slot and at the same time it seems silly that you start loading your guns when the battle already started....

It was standard practice to load and run out the guns at dawn in the Royal Navy, until it was proven the horizon was clear, if ships were sighted the same would occur until the ships identity was known, Indeed penalties for being caught unaware were severe under the Articles of War, A Captain could even be hanged for dereliction of duty or even cowardice for losing his command to an enemy with unloaded cannons or through neglect. 

[King of Crowns]

you used to surrender to avoid a massive crew replenishment bill. perhaps that idea needs to be revisited. Crew bill is just a joke right now. and it will help to reduce inflation

[Cecil Selous]

I can imagine that it would be to hard on the database, but I always wanted the crew to be somehow persistent to make it more valuable. That way you could tie the ship knowledge to the crew of the ship and not to the captain (us). And imo this makes more sense too. Knowing as a captain how to handle shit, won't help you if your crew is full of landlubbers. If they survive many engagements, then you have all knowledge slots, but you can lose them (maybe not all) if your ship sinks and with it the whole crew. Of course the speed of gaining experience must be tweaked to not make it frustrating after every lost ship. Additionally there could be some kind of ransom system, where you have to pay your opponent some gold to get your crew back after a surrender or a lost boarding action. 

 

For Naval Action 2 and maybe also easier for the database: Officers like master, lieutenants, carpenter, purser, boatswain, captain of the marines, gunner, surgeon, caulker ..... to which the knowledge is tied to. So every ship has one specific slot which represents the knowledge and skill these officers have. There would be no need for extra modules or books, since every officer gains experience in his specific skill and becomes better and better. For example: Long living lieutenants give buffs to sail setting speed, turning the yards, reload times etc. Thus combining the multiple knowledge slots we need now, to get the sailing buffs into one. The master would be getting buffs for navigation, trim etc. A Carpenter would be getting better and better at repairing, The Captain of the marines gains boarding buffs and the Gunner will maybe have an impact on powder quality (+penetration) and minimize the chance of fire in the magazine. Maybe even accuracy because of better gun maintenance.

A sinking ship would mean the loss of the officers. The impact of the rest of the crew on knowledge will maybe stay marginal or even zero. Captains who will care for their officers/crew (surrender, when loss is certain and inevitable) will have more efficient ships. No imbalance between two ships because of the individual choice of modules (or luck in case of rare books). Everyone will have some buffs in every category. The deciding factor is, how long are your officers "alive" and did they see a lot of action already.

[Hawkwood]

I think i saw a post from Mr. Koltes, suggesting to implement the options, when enemy boarded.. But cant find it.

Basically the idea was to either: sink the ship, capture it, or even give it back to previous owner(kind of " enemy boards me,loots the cargo, but gives me ship back instantly" option.)

It wouldnt change reward status if ship given back, which is good for winner, and the one who lost the battle keeps the ship, if he surrenders. Sounds fair to me.

[Thonys]

11 minutes ago, Cortez said:

I think i saw a post from Mr. Koltes, suggesting to implement the options, when enemy boarded.. But cant find it.

Basically the idea was to either: sink the ship, capture it, or even give it back to previous owner(kind of " enemy boards me,loots the cargo, but gives me ship back instantly" option.)

It wouldnt change reward status if ship given back, which is good for winner, and the one who lost the battle keeps the ship, if he surrenders. Sounds fair to me.

well its known... they bought back the captured ship..so i think a valid option for the conqueror of the ship [[   is a option to make for the developers when >> surrender the ship ]]

of course the cargo is captured :))

Edited February 6, 2018 by Thonys

[Hawkwood]

33 minutes ago, Thonys said:

well its known... they bought back the captured ship..so i think a valid option for the conqueror of the ship [[   is a option to make for the developers when >> surrender the ship ]]

of course the cargo is captured :))

Not buying the ship.

Example. You damage me so badly i am not able to continue the battle, or just win boarding= i surrender, and you can loot the ship, but, only BUT, if you are willing to do so, you can return me the ship in this "loot menu" we already have. Just need another option, we have 2 already, take in fleet, sink, and the 3rd one would be "return" or something like that.

Rewards remain the same when you return the ship, just as if you would sink me(balance), you get the cargo, i keep the ship if you are merciful, everyone happy and it is balanced.

Just saying.

[Hethwill, the Red Duke]

If we ever return to a state where there's raiding for cargo everywhere ( and marks are not the reward ... tbh marks will always beat the value of cargo 5 times minimum ) then I would definitely need the 3rd option you propose.

If...

[Liq]

I think most of the times, players would be willing to buy their ships back for more than the enemy gets out of it - e.g. a frigate well equipped, spent about 20 - 25 pvp marks worth on it, only grants about 10 pvp marks when sank.

This probably also has to do with the human mindset of wanting to destroy things.

The more ships that make it out of a battle (surrendered or capped), the more ships there are to be sold / traded, the more pvp there is.

Conclusion:

Make it worth to surrender and give us fleet perk 1 as default

Edited February 6, 2018 by Liq

[Navalus Magnus]

What about the suggestions in this thread!?

They might be a solution for the same problem.

[Baptiste Gallouédec]

Maybe give negative pvp marks when sunk or captured without previous surrender ?  

I mean, no one can have less than zero pvp marks ofc, by surrendering you loose your ship but you preserve your pvp marks. The attacker can then choose to board you and either capture or sink it for pvp marks. Kill / assists are still distributed by the amount of damage done before the  surrender, if no damage done before the surrender, the kill is granted to the one who explored it and sunk it.

[Hethwill, the Red Duke]

Just now, rediii said:

You die you lose 1 knowledge slot of your ship.

 

I would surrender every battle, even portbattles

So.... we returning to "officer lives" again... just with a different name... ?

I thought it was a unwelcome mechanic 

[Hethwill, the Red Duke]

Er... pain is fleeting.

Wasn't the officer loss a unwelcome mechanic !?

( same as everything hardcore ? )

[Guest]

You don't need to lose a whole slot. You could lose a fraction of a slot XP. So you will lose your 5th slot but get it back in 1 battle. 

All this is dumb though, all you will accomplish is people surrendering in the last moment before their ship sinks. 

[Hethwill, the Red Duke]

Fair enough.

I support everything that brings us closer to the age of sail experience and more away from the counterstrike rvr metashipzorz.

 

[Hethwill, the Red Duke]

Yes. Less is more.

Thx.

[z4ys]

12 hours ago, Liq said:

f this was going to be added, fleet perk 1 should be default IMO. Noone uses fleetships for PvP anyway, its sole purpose is to be able to capture a ship. We shouldnt need a perk for that IMO.

Fleet perk is not used because most pvp player dont skill it in order to not waste a point. By making it free we will see AI ships more. But i agree there should be an emergancy fleet perk mechanic. That means you can capture 1 ship after a battle but as soon you enter port you have to dismiss/keep the ship in order to leave port again.

[Baptiste Gallouédec]

3 hours ago, Flinch said:

You don't need to lose a whole slot. You could lose a fraction of a slot XP. So you will lose your 5th slot but get it back in 1 battle. 

All this is dumb though, all you will accomplish is people surrendering in the last moment before their ship sinks. 

We still want people to fight and have fun, the idea is not to push everyone to surrender as soon as targetted, by surrendering you escape the penalty  for being sunk  (the knowledge xp seems a good idea)  and your attacker get the choice to explore your ship before choosing if he want to keep it or get pvp marks. 

Edited February 6, 2018 by Baptiste Gallouédec

[H2O]

15 hours ago, Liq said:

I am not sure what that benefit in surrendering could be.

Player Reputation. Long awaited addition that could fix so many problems. Reputation could open new missions, events, ships and other cool stuff. 

Sinking would slowly damage your reputation.