Open world hunting

[Tac]

2 minutes ago, Sovereign said:

 

I think it is pretty silly how the devs gave us this huge map, only to have everyone play in a few patrol and safe zones...

There lies the problem good sir.

[Corona Lisa]

48 minutes ago, victor said:

of course of course, man ... traders can effectively fight back on gankers.

Go on like that redii (and also the multi banned privateer), you just give more and more arguments to your detractors showing that you just do not have enough of your PVP skills: no you want to get even more (easy) kills, also by changing game mechanics in your favor.

You gain problably 70-100 PVP marks a day but  - no - it's not enough! Just spoil the day of other players to get some more!

Why do you play on the PvP server if you dont want to fight? Because of the community/Clan you are in?

Might add that this isnt meant as insult and a serious question before someone feels offended again.

Edited April 5, 2018 by Jon Snow lets go

[Fenris]

3 hours ago, Archaos said:

I still do not get the mentality of the so called hardcore PvP'ers, even the title of the thread "open world hunting" gives an indication of what they want. They feel they are hunters and want more prey. They are not looking for good fights, they are looking for easy human targets and that is why they want to get rid of safe zones and force everyone out into the open world so they can have a target rich environment so they can brag and wave their epeen around as to how good they are for beating up on players who are not as experienced or well equipped as them.

There is a constant stream of OW hunters hanging round the safe zone outside KPR all moaning that high rank players are doing missions in the safe zone, they complained so much that they changed the RoE so that battles against AI in the safe zone remain open. If half of these hunters hanging around KPR changed to the British nation and went out attacking the other half hanging around then they would have plenty of OW action, but no, they would rather moan and look for ways to gank people who who at the time are not looking for PvP and moan on the forums that OW hunting is dead.

Explained.

[AeRoTR]

Tell you guys, people need hundreds of hours, tens of tens of pvp fights to become an average player. So a guy who is saying traders should fight, that guy has hundrerds of pvp, thousands of hours of gameplay, sorry It is not correct.

A guy even with 500 hours gameplay time with a few pvp experience is a baby seal, still !

I do think @admin and devs already understood the nature of player base after spending this many years and experiments. I do trust in them, would be happy if they do not shape the game for the sake of 50 elite pvpers, ignoring the remaining huge majority, some of which has never visited this forum

Mr. Elite Pvp guy, your cure is increasing population, keeping average players in game by giving them content, not raping them, so they will be fighting in the future. 

Keep coming to KPR, we are ready waiting for you. You can even announce on global chat so we will ready enough players for your taste. Also so many of our newbies attacking AI out of KPR in safe waters so you can join, and also we can.

 

[Christendom]

Safe zones are fine.  The incentives to leave them....are not.

Full crafting inside the zones.  No increased chance to make purple/gold ships in outside ports.  Can run all missions inside the zones.  Who needs labor hour reductions when you can just buy endless labor contracts with your endless supply of combat marks.  The game needs to incentive people leave the zones and setting up crafting hubs elsewhere on the map.  Bring back crafting regions or at the very lease make it so gold/purp ships have a higher chance of being crafted outside of the safe zones and a zero chance in them.  

We need to also be honest here and mention that the game currently does not have enough people in it to support a vibrant open world.  Chances of finding a random person in a far corner of the map are slim and sharks will of course go to where their prey is plentiful....and that's the capitals.  If this game had double it's population organic PVP would happen more frequently and we probably wouldn't be talking in this post.  I remember at the very start of the split when EU had 1200-1300 people for a short time, trying to sail around and open world hunt WITHOUT running into a dozen people you didn't want to run into was difficult.  This game needs more players.

So there real question we should be asking here is......Where have all the players gone?  Why does the development team seemingly ignore creating content for the bread and butter of MMO games, the casual players.  Missions are stale, old and lack variety.  Why do we not have simple escort missions or exploration type quests?  Why do we not have a more complex crafting system or economy to keep those casual or non-PVP oriented players engaged?  Instead the development team keeps waffling back and forth over the same dozen or so ideas to "improve PVP" when in realty the only thing that will real fix PVP in this game is more players.  

It's time to fix the cause of why we don't have players in this game and stop trying to fix the symptoms.  PVP or RVR is never going to get better if the population numbers continue to drop.

Edited April 5, 2018 by Christendom

[Corona Lisa]

1 minute ago, AeRoTR said:

A guy even with 500 hours gameplay time with a few pvp experience is a baby seal, still !

Thats the problem of this game.

2 minutes ago, AeRoTR said:

keeping average players in game by giving them content, not raping them, so they will be fighting in the future.

They are the only ones which can engage, the battle is open the whole time infromt of their capital. Do you want us to fail intentionally so that the other side has more fun?

[Hethwill, the Red Duke]

Pro PvP powergaming ( it is a natural thing in mmo, to maximise the "toon", right ? );  should not be confused with efficient pvp with whatever ship build, which is more akin to "learn the qualities of the ship and the defects of others"; modules/builds are of no concern.

Truth is no Pro PvPer ( or whatever you want to call them ) would play with a "whatever ship rng given by the admiralty". They must have the half win button, 80% of them. Equal fights... riiiiight.... Barely they talk about 1:3 like the 1% aces actually do, more glory to them.

At least have the decency of raiding trade with proper privateering models.

Just as a comparison... well not really but food for thought...been playing dynamic wars in another game where the captain of the ship has to use whatever he is given ( or the HQ can provide ) and with a high degree of uncertainty of what will be found on the way in and back from the missions. Perma death. Dead is dead. So it is a fight to win, and a fight to survive.

Not a fight to gloat like hogs in pro pvp mud.

[fox2run]

2 minutes ago, rediii said:

its the problem of players that first grind to maxrank and want to sail the big shit and dont just level with pvp

Level with PvP is really crappy nowadays as losses demand too much grind or knowledge to recover from. 

Bring multi duras back in the game. Ships needs to be cheap. Otherwise you will never rank anywhere on PvP alone.

Never understood why ships should be hard to get in a PvP game.

Imagine how many online players warthunder would have if you needed to use a week to craft a tank.

No wonder why players leave. 

[Njord]

2 hours ago, victor said:

READ CAREFULLY MATE: because safe zones create a safe economic space to build an economy for easy factions (Spain, USA and GB) and because safe zones let PVE oriented players to produce the resources that PVP (and RVR) players will consume.

So basically - by creating safe zones - Devs simply followed the example of EVE online and applied the basics of any MMO.

NO NEED TO GET ALL EXCITED ONLY BECAUSE WE DISAGREE MATE

I never played EVE but despite its age it has more active players than NA ever will have ( I hope I am wrong here, I really want NA to succeed but I just don't see it happening ) and I assume it used to be even more. Do the safe zones in EVE have everything you need too? What motivates people to leave it? 

 The whole map in NA is a safe economic space. I can make millions by just afk trading during low server pop times and I haven't lost a single trader yet. No player in NA is in serious economic trouble, once he learned the ropes of the game and doesn't waste his gold on purpose. I know you are a main trader, so you should know. 

Can you really compare the two games? Why did NA have more players before the introduction of safezones? What motivates people to leave zones?

2 hours ago, Jon Snow lets go said:

Why dont you see it as a chance to get better and to learn?

 

2 hours ago, Jon Snow lets go said:

And if you dont want to fight at all why are you on the PvP server?

Thank you very much. I see you are one of the few able to apply common sense and logic on this topic. Shame you only have one upvote.

Why are people on the PvP server, if they don't want to fight players and have their PvE play in safety? There is a server for it. Why does GL still pay for the PvE server anyways?

These people are to me like a boy that is in a football team always moaning and complaining, instead of practicing to get better because they can't be honest with themselves and join the ballet class.

You are prey by choice and not because other players make you or game mechanics. No player started the game as skilled PvP god. Only players that don't try to get better and practice are easy kills and it is nothing but their own fault. You can't hope to ever be able to compete with seasoned PvP players with the weak defeatist attitude "Well, I'm easy prey anyways so the safezone should protect me forever".

Maybe one day I will find out why there are so many players moaning about PvP, ganking and the world being unfair when they could be at peace on the PvE server but chose the PvP one. It doesn't make any sense to me.

2 hours ago, Banished Privateer said:

"some breathing room" as most players spend most of their time in the safe zones. They craft all ships, attack NPCs, trade, do missions there, 80% of server content is inside the safe zone. The other 20% rare and end-game stuff they just need to pay with gold in the safe zone.

Pretty much what I am thinking, thanks for sharing.

1 hour ago, Banished Privateer said:

You choose if you're the victim and a loser and just chain and run away. 95% players choose to be the victim. 

Wish I could give this more than one like. Nothing but the truth. Nice kills by the way.

[victor]

1 hour ago, Tac said:

Did you just suggest redii lacks Pvp skills and looks for easy kills?

 

 

No I suggest just that - since Redii (and the banished priveteer also) both have PVP skills and  also now do a lot of OS PVP - I do not understand why they support the ideas of other people clearly looking just for easy kills

Edited April 5, 2018 by victor

[AeRoTR]

@rediii please spend your time, explaining your valuable ideas to those players who forms the majority of population. Good luck

It is your greatness that you achieved so many great deeds with 200 hours, I am deeply impressed but I really do not care, as you may be an exception. 

 

 

[victor]

14 minutes ago, Sovereign said:

Thank you very much. I see you are one of the few able to apply common sense and logic on this topic. Shame you only have one upvote.

Read what Devs stated in the other thread on the same topic. the presence of big safe zones it's not a matter of different ideas, it's a matter of game design. 

And I get excited since this is the 100ish topic of the 100th new player based on the same two assumptions:

1) safe zones are there just to protect newbies

2) the old "why do not go to PVE server" refrain.

BUT

As far as assumption 1, Devs already clarified at least five times in this forum that that is not the function of safe zones!

As far as assumpiont 2: OK mate, let half (or even more, based on my perception) of the game population going in another server (or quit the game) as you suggest, and then let's see where your fantastic full PVP game will end up. I already saw this happening in the past once (300 players online) and personally I would not like to repeat the experience just beacuse you want to yarrrrrrr a bit more than now.

Edited April 5, 2018 by victor

[fox2run]

Redii is an extremely skilled player which I have had the honour to meet in battle a few times. 

He is far above average. 

But here lies the blindness for many good players and developers. They think too much on their own needs and not the need for other groups of players.

Some players loose more ships than they can possible recover within a reasonable amount of time. 

It's one of the Achilles heels of this game.

 

[victor]

28 minutes ago, Christendom said:

Safe zones are fine.  The incentives to leave them....are not.

Full crafting inside the zones.  No increased chance to make purple/gold ships in outside ports.  Can run all missions inside the zones.  Who needs labor hour reductions when you can just buy endless labor contracts with your endless supply of combat marks.  The game needs to incentive people leave the zones and setting up crafting hubs elsewhere on the map.  Bring back crafting regions or at the very lease make it so gold/purp ships have a higher chance of being crafted outside of the safe zones and a zero chance in them.  

We need to also be honest here and mention that the game currently does not have enough people in it to support a vibrant open world.  Chances of finding a random person in a far corner of the map are slim and sharks will of course go to where their prey is plentiful....and that's the capitals.  If this game had double it's population organic PVP would happen more frequently and we probably wouldn't be talking in this post.  I remember at the very start of the split when EU had 1200-1300 people for a short time, trying to sail around and open world hunt WITHOUT running into a dozen people you didn't want to run into was difficult.  This game needs more players.

So there real question we should be asking here is......Where have all the players gone?  Why does the development team seemingly ignore creating content for the bread and butter of MMO games, the casual players.  Missions are stale, old and lack variety.  Why do we not have simple escort missions or exploration type quests?  Why do we not have a more complex crafting system or economy to keep those casual or non-PVP oriented players engaged?  Instead the development team keeps waffling back and forth over the same dozen or so ideas to "improve PVP" when in realty the only thing that will real fix PVP in this game is more players.  

It's time to fix the cause of why we don't have players in this game and stop trying to fix the symptoms.  PVP or RVR is never going to get better if the population numbers continue to drop.

Wise words. 

[IndianaGeoff]

46 minutes ago, Jon Snow lets go said:

Why do you play on the PvP server if you dont want to fight? Because of the community/Clan you are in?

Might add that this isnt meant as insult and a serious question before someone feels offended again.

Because I don't have a large amount of gaming time most nights.  Most nights I have a hour or two.  In that hour or two I want to have fun as I define it.  Now fun is not coming out of the port, seeing 5 experienced rats in fast, big ships sinking everything that undocks (as it was pre safe zones during the hard mode era).  Yes, I know you can be the counter gank squad, but the odds of getting a meaningful fight is low when a credible defense fleet is low.  Game mechanics made counter gank fleets worthless.  End result, I stopped logging in.

Safe zones helped somewhat, but by then the damage was done.  Rafts of experienced players quit playing because the game ceased to be fun.

I think I am like a lot of Casual players.  Exactly the people who will be the largest volume of future players.  My play time would look a  lot like this...

Once or twice a week, I will get on for an extended session.  This might be 3 hours or so.  In that time I would participate in RvR, extended hunting with a group or maybe a patrol in a solo fighter.  I would have an hour or 2 to play maybe 2 or 3 nights a week.  In those sessions I would get on, find out what was going on and make a quick decision to fight or goof off.  If there was a real defense fleet, I would join it to protect the home waters.  Maybe join a RvR hostility group.  I could do a free port dance.  But that decision will have to be made in 5 to 10 minutes of logging on. 

If that is not happening, then I'll run a trade route or grab a ship for AI leveling.  If I decide to make the safe decision, then I need a reasonable expectation of safety.  If I can't to 9 out of 10 trade missions, I won't do it.  If I start an AI mission and there is a 50/50 change I will get ganked and sunk, I won't do it.  If I am out in a 1st rate to get slots opened, my risk tolerance is very low.  OH, and I am not sailing a ship I can't replace.  With the PvP mark system for 1st rates, she is not sailing.

In my normal session I have work the next day.  The worst case for me is being a hour into it and I get tagged in a ship I can't afford to lose.  Yes, I can probably get to safety, maybe win.  But that whole process will take an hour... maybe more.  So now I am late to bed and a good chance I lost a good ship.  That is the definition of not fun.

Some nights I just want to get on and do low risk grinding.  For one thing, that is necessary to open slots, find rare upgrades, level (if you are not max level) or get gold.

I have not played in quite a while now.  People in this game think that it is special because it is a unique ship sailing game.  There are parts of the game that are spectacular.  That is why I have a hope it will be fun some day.  But I have given up on it.  I can log into Elder Scrolls Online and have a fun night.  I can PvP, I can do easy solo play, I can do small groups against AI that is challenging or very challenging.  I can farm mats for crafting, I can grind gear.  I can look for trading arbitrage.  I have not done RvR, but I am in a guild that does that some and if I am a PvP/RvR Hardmode demon, the game has that.  You can duel anyplace if you want.  They regularly introduce new content, have events and you are able to customize your look to your hearts content.  Every night I can advance my character in some way while doing something I enjoy.  That game has thousands of players each night all doing their own thing.  I will never be a max max player.  I know that, but there is plenty for me to do.

Someday, I hope this game is like that.  But I have given up.  It stopped being fun last summer.  It took me far to long to move on, but I have.  And I think my story is very common.  If a game is not fun for a player, playing the game they way they want to play, they will leave.  No amount of cool ships and guns will fix that.  In the end, the goals of this game even if fully realized will result in it being a low population niche game.  That means it won't survive long term.  Given that analysis (IMHO), investing time into it is not worth it.  But that is fine, I have gotten plenty of hours of fun for my investment.  I was ready to move on.

Face it.  This game is not attracting new players, if one stumbles in they last a month... tops. People are not playing anymore on Twitch.  Game supporting websites are dead.  Trading sites are useless.  A successful game going from Alpha to Beta and eventually release should be building more and more players.  We should be talking about how it's too busy and we need a new server.  Instead we are losing population and merging servers and losing more population.  It is not working.  It is a not a marketable game.  There are not enough working pieces for a successful game.

Those are the hard facts.  It is in a death spiral.

[Njord]

1 minute ago, victor said:

function of safe zones

The main function of safe zones is to protect new players and comfort and hush those that are not familiar / can not handle the nature of a PvP MMO game, but still ended up on the PvP server anyhow. Think of the devs like parents that have 2 children and put the moaning younger one into daycare or with a babysitter so nothing can go wrong, while the older one is mature and experienced enough to handle things on his own. The parents ( devs ) finally can focus on important things. The problem is even tho the younger one is safe from the teasing of the older, he can't learn anything from him and won't be as independent or successful as the older one, unless he leaves daycare / the babysitter - but why should he when he can be safe and complain about his older brother instead? 

18 minutes ago, victor said:

As far as assumpiont 2: OK mate, let half (or even more, based on my perception) of the game population going in another server (or quit the game) as you suggest, and then let's see what where your fantastic full PVP game will end up. I already saw this happening in the past once (300 players online) and personally I would not like to repeat the experience just beacuse you want to yarrrrrrr a bit more than now.

A player that is not interested in PvP and wants to be immune to it has no value to a PvP game. Everything a PvE player can craft a PvP player can craft aswell. A player on the PvP server that is not available for combat does not provide any meaningful content and I dare to say he won't be missed by many.

I would answer the question what happens, if a PvE player leaves the PvP server with another question:

"If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"

[victor]

1 minute ago, Sovereign said:

The main function of safe zones is to protect new players and comfort and hush those that are not familiar / can not handle the nature of a PvP MMO game,

NO, that's rather YOUR idea of safe zones, while devs stated multiple times that they created safe zones with another purpose (creating a safe self-sustainable economic area for easy nations).

4 minutes ago, Sovereign said:

A player on the PvP server that is not available for combat does not provide any meaningful content and I dare to say he won't be missed by many.

It's not a problem of missing or not a player. The problem is that a game with a little playerbase will just die if too many players leave: since dedicated PVP players are - and I'm being generous - just the half of the actual playerbase of this game, this means that this server - if just PVPers stay here and all the others go - would reduce the population to 300ish players. Then good luck in finding your beloved PVP in this infinite open world with just 300 players online!

 

 

[fox2run]

I'm still trying to recover my losses at last wipe. LOL.

It's the whole basic thinking that lacks understanding.

Hey. Are you my customer? Ok. Use hours on ranking up. Then we take everything you got and make it a nightmare to use big ships as it is only meant for a small elitist group in closed port battles where we dont not like outsiders.

Want that 1st rate back? Forget it. You don't belong to the elite...

No wonder many have left over time.

[Nelsons Barrel]

1 minute ago, fox2run said:

I'm still trying to recover my losses at last wipe. LOL.

It's the whole basic thinking that lacks understanding.

Hey. Are you my customer? Ok. Use hours on ranking up. Then we take everything you got and make it a nightmare to use big ships as it is only meant for a small elitist group in closed port battles where we dont not like outsiders.

Want that 1st rate back? Forget it. You don't belong to the elite...

No wonder many have left over time.

I only see you crying about how expensive ships are but really, you should just play the game. You are danish... ask @Lars Kjaer how to make money. One day of trading and you should be able to buy every ship you want with all upgrades you want on it.

[IndianaGeoff]

1 minute ago, Nelsons Barrel said:

I only see you crying about how expensive ships are but really, you should just play the game. You are danish... ask @Lars Kjaer how to make money. One day of trading and you should be able to buy every ship you want with all upgrades you want on it.

Yea, right.  Lets see you do that with a couple capped traders brigs.

[Archaos]

3 hours ago, Jon Snow lets go said:

You certainly got a point there, ganking is cancer (5v1 etc) and frustrating for the one who got ganked espcially.

 

But then again in your view if you start fighting those guys you are the prey. Why dont you see it as a chance to get better and to learn? You see exactly what ships the enemy has (as long as you dont sail to far out which you dont have to most of the time) and can bring similar to get a nice fight. And if you dont want to fight at all why are you on the PvP server?

Well to give you a recent example of when I left the Belize safe zone, I was jumped by 3 Spaniards and even though I sunk one of them the others just kept me in battle by shooting from range till they could bring in reinforcements then let me leave the battle so they could tag me again. Even with a 4v1 it took them over an hour to take me down and that was only because they were able to rotate their ships for repairs.

Look at a lot of the battles that have been happening recently around the KPR safe zone where an organised group arrive and jump in on some player attacking AI in the zone, the person shouts for help in nation and maybe a few people might jump in to help, but usually it is a trap and as soon as a few players jump in the attackers have more waiting to join, you end up with an organised attack force all on teamspeak with ships kitted out for PvP facing a pick up group of random players most of whom are not on TS and havent a clue how to follow orders. The battle can only have one outcome and then follows the recriminations in nation chat about who's fault it is. To take it to the extreme if a fleet of 25 aggressors turned up outside KPR there is absolutely no way the defenders could field a fleet to combat that as you would always get some person entering the fight in a basic cutter or some other unsuitable ship thus cutting down who can join on defenders side.

I used to actively patrol the waters around KPR about 1.5 years ago and join in in PvP battles against the aggressors, but like most I gave up because the attackers were not looking for fair fights they were looking for easy kills and as soon as the odds were even or not in their favor they would run. Spending hours chasing people around KPR without fights was not fun and that is what is happening again. 

[IndianaGeoff]

15 minutes ago, rediii said:

300 pvp players is pretty big. I think atm it would be way less

 

most problems go away with more players like the problem discussed here too.

For that UI etc. has to be in place.

The problem is not the UI.  The problem is fun.  Unless the fun problem is fixed, the UI is irrelevant.

[victor]

3 minutes ago, rediii said:

Wrong. UI is irrelevant for you and me but if you look into steamreviews it is not

I guess the game needs more content overall. Just more and new things can bring in new players or induce some of the old ones to get back.

Edited April 5, 2018 by victor

[IndianaGeoff]

1 minute ago, Archaos said:

Well to give you a recent example of when I left the Belize safe zone, I was jumped by 3 Spaniards and even though I sunk one of them the others just kept me in battle by shooting from range till they could bring in reinforcements then let me leave the battle so they could tag me again. Even with a 4v1 it took them over an hour to take me down and that was only because they were able to rotate their ships for repairs.

Look at a lot of the battles that have been happening recently around the KPR safe zone where an organised group arrive and jump in on some player attacking AI in the zone, the person shouts for help in nation and maybe a few people might jump in to help, but usually it is a trap and as soon as a few players jump in the attackers have more waiting to join, you end up with an organised attack force all on teamspeak with ships kitted out for PvP facing a pick up group of random players most of whom are not on TS and havent a clue how to follow orders. The battle can only have one outcome and then follows the recriminations in nation chat about who's fault it is. To take it to the extreme if a fleet of 25 aggressors turned up outside KPR there is absolutely no way the defenders could field a fleet to combat that as you would always get some person entering the fight in a basic cutter or some other unsuitable ship thus cutting down who can join on defenders side.

I used to actively patrol the waters around KPR about 1.5 years ago and join in in PvP battles against the aggressors, but like most I gave up because the attackers were not looking for fair fights they were looking for easy kills and as soon as the odds were even or not in their favor they would run. Spending hours chasing people around KPR without fights was not fun and that is what is happening again. 

A defense fleet is not going to stop the initial gank.  You can't get there in the short time.  Meanwhile the gank fleet is organized to get in the battle.

The first gankee is toast.  Now at one time, you could count on a defense fleet forming.  Best case, the gankee is sunk in 20 minutes, the gank fleet sits for a bit, then comes out.   They scatter, and the defense fleet tags one and you spend a hour in a running battle that is inconclusive.  The rest of the gank fleet gets free.

More typical, the gank fleet has an alt in that nation.  They watch the nation chat, see a defense fleet forming.  They sail out in a cutter, see where the fleet is. The gank fleet decides to make the battle last longer, when it's over they max out in the battle.  The defense fleet sits around for an hour more, doing nothing, then one by one peel off to do something fun.  A couple gankers come out in fast ships, draw the remaining defense fleet off, and the rest of the gankers exit and sail off.  The gank fleet goes out to sea, logs.  They log in alts play for an hour. Then log back in and gank again since the defense fleet is long gone.

Defense duty is a waste of time, people stop defending and it's open season on anything bigger than a brig.

[IndianaGeoff]

6 minutes ago, rediii said:

Wrong. UI is irrelevant for you and me but if you look into steamreviews it is not

People don't quit because of the UI.  It is just the salt on the wound that is easy to mock.  You have a winning game when people say (as they did a year ago), "The game is incredible even though the UI sucks."  Today it is, "The game is dead, and the UI sucks too."