3 circle system in PB = The kiting is back

[Tiedemann]

Hello!

My view on premium ship
So lately these Le Requins have been appearing more and more in deep water pbs. They are quite useful for grabbing empty circles, killing mortar brigs and harassing players who guard/hold circles. Right now the Requin is extremely fast, rides low in the water so its hard to hit at a distance, not the easiest ship to demast imo and has very low BR. So bang for the buck it is awsome. You can shot down a Le Requin to under 50% internal structure and even take out one mast, but if your not in an upwind position or in a upwind capable ship, they are very hard to finish off.  Those ships often just limp away upwind, repair and then it's the same story all very again. As long as they stay at long distance (3-400+ meters) they are basically unsinkable in my experience.     

It's much of the same for the Hercules, it is OP compared to the BR it requires to enter. Do you want a large frigate or 2 small fast super Shallow-Frigates? So they are starting to enter deep water pbs also, but at least they sink much easier than the Le Requin.    

Then consider that if your team are in control of a circle, you don't get points any points when an enemy is present in that circle or "riding the edge".

The "Wack a mole" strategy
Half a year ago I was part of an attack on a shallow water port, where our opponent used this "Whack a mole" strategy.  60 min into the PB we had destroyd the defenders main fleet, but they still had 3 Prince de Neufchatel and a fast Mercury. And they used those ships to harass our players who where holding circles and we could not gain points fast enough to win whne those shitty ships keept joining the circle at an upwind position. When ever we got them low, they just sailed upwind and repaired. In one circle when 1 ship left, another join at the opposite corner.. So it was basicly a 30 minutes of "whack a mole", and we lost.

I fear we now are going to see more of this strategy. In a 2500BR port you can in theory fit 33x Le Requins..  Now you can't fit that but imagine fighting 25 Le Requins with a conventional pb fleet. It's not my idea of fun, and it is defenitly not why I joined grinding the pb! I'm not going to suggest fleet setups here, but it is easy to get room for 5-10 Le Requins and still have some high BR ships for kiting. And you may not kill all that much with such a fleet setup, because your defending you don't need to. All you need to do is run while you do all you can to deny the attackers points.
2-3 Le Requin can easily do drive by shoting at 15,5 kn while they sail in and out of the circles for 1,5 hour, most efficient way to counter Le Requins is by bringing Le Requins.. And to pull the wack a mole stratigy of you don't need mroe than 5-6 Le Requins, 350 - 420BR. So you still have 2080 - 2150BR to make a good running/kiting fleet for defending a port..

Latest pbs with premium ships (finger pointing)
11.06.18 we had 2 pbs. And I'm a gentleman, so I'm not going to name anyone, because I have pictures!  So from my extremely partial view: the defenders where basically just avoiding combat with their main fleet, while they had several premium ships to harass the attackers players in the circles and there by denying attacker points in the process.
As you all can see we also use the premium ships, but it is necessary now to be compatible in RvR.

Little Cayman: 

2. PB at Cayman Brac: They brought even more premium ships, but we came better prepared this time!

SOLUTION
Solution is pretty clear imo, this point blocking with lower BR in the circle must end! Entire reason for 3 circles was to force defender to stay and defend their port. And this was not an issue in the beginning of the 3 circle system.. So we need the older version of the 3 circle system back! The team with highest BR in the circle should capture it and as long as they have the highest BR in the circle or the circle is unchallenged it should generate points. Only way to block point generation from a circle should be by capturing it. This is simple and efficient because it forces teams into decisive battles in and around these circles.. 

Le Requins in Shallow water pbs
As long as the Le Requin can enter shallow water port battles, I will try my best to avoid them.

Edited January 13, 2019 by Tiedemann

[Batman]

Kiting happened before Le Rekt. I agree, it's a very annoying ship and a perfect troll ship.

I would completly get away from the three circle system and introduce a two circle system to prevent kiting. One infront of the port, one at the square fort.

This would work for most ports and eliminate kiting. But admin already said we shouldn't expect any changes to rvr soon, so I guess we have to live with this shitty boat in PBs.

[Archaos]

In the two battles you show here I do not think the fact that they were DLC ships made any difference as the same could have been achieved with fast Princes or Mercs. In the Little Cayman battle you side took initial advantage by taking our mortar brig out very early on (my inexperience there, by not starting to move quick enough once I had been ranged), then you quickly took out the forts and this gave you the advantage. As I see it your problems started when your big ships then tried to defend the mortar brigs after they had done their job instead of going for the circles and then you ended up on the beach. Your first rates made no attempt to go for circles A and C and that is why the battle turned in our favor. The only effect of DLC ship was the Le Requin kiting your Buc in circle A, which you could have dealt with by releasing your Le Requins from A or B once your big ships were there. As I see it you were beaten by your own inaction there.

The Cayman Brac battle was more the other way round, we took initial advantage by taking out your mortar brig early. I went the long way round to get to the mortar brig in a Le Requin and was chased by 2 of your Le Requins who I left for dust (that is down to build and setup rather than ship). Our problem was we took too much damage killing the mortar brig and ended up losing a Hercules. Not really sure where we went wrong after that, the square fort is really in a bad position and really gave no help protecting any circles and once you got your Wasa to help out the Endy in circle C our Wasa did not stand much chance. Our 1st rate that had been defending B went to assist the other big ships capturing A I think and that battle ended up taking the big ships well out of the range of circles and with the wind change it was hard to get back. We were unable to cap any of the circles back which gave you the win. To tell the truth I would not even bother in future going for the mortar brig in that port as the forts do not protect the circles apart from one small one protecting circle A which was easily killed by 1st rates anyway.

Overall although I do agree that the DLC ships may be OP in a lot of respects I do not think they make that much difference in a port battle as both sides can bring them in. I doubt very much that 25 Le Requins could win a PB against 1st rates. If you go down the route of higher BR in a circle gains points then I am sure a new meta will develop where it just becomes about having more BR in the circle to gain points for the win rather than fight the battle.

Maybe they should make it about winning the circles and forget the point loss for losing ships as I think it is the fear of losing points when ships sink that makes people avoid engaging in Port Battles.

[Christendom]

NO DLC SHIPS IN PBs EVER!

[Guest]

3 hours ago, Christendom said:

NO DLC SHIPS IN PBs EVER!

Oh ffs.... I agree.. Simple solution: no DLC ships in PBs and problem is solved..

[HachiRoku]

What is the point of DLC ships that cannot enter pbs? Issue is mechanics and unbalanced ships. 

Few simple solutions imo. 

balance sailing profile of the requin and br of any ships that are "op". The Herc with its guns might always be an issue but as I have said 100 times before dismasting should be more about hp and less about thickness. 18 pounders have less of an advantage in hull bashing because shallow ships are harder targets so at ranges you actually hit,  you pen mostly anyway. 

Make them capturable until battle over so they don't have an advantage over non dlc ships. 

Last but not least, shallow ships need a good turn rate nerf overall if you ask me and maybe a speed nerf too. 

Remove 3 circle system and replace it with 1 circle.  In the past there was no shore and circle was way bigger so if you were lucky you could kite all day in port battles. I believe 1 circle could force actual battles but the one issue it has is that most would just take a full meta ship setup. The reason for this of course is that armor thickness on oceans is still to much. Until 9 pounders pen all ships at a good angles at 250m there will always be a retarded ocean meta. Santis hull is older model and therefore flat and that makes bouncing harder for example but armor of the 2 ships still being the same obviously breaks the Santis in comparison. 

 

 

Edited July 12, 2018 by HachiRoku

[Lovec1990]

DLC ships should be kinda more eye candy than be OP they could join PBs

[Tom Farseer]

8 hours ago, Tiedemann said:

 the defenders where basically just avoiding combat with their main fleet,

This is both true and untrue 😁. I was commanding our heavy fleet, consisting of three oceans. My aim from the beginning was to keep your main fleet from advancing to Circles A and C so that you were unable to generate enough points in time. Once we had to engage we somewhat engaged (with me messing  up one turn order, allowing you to sandwich us and take me out fairly quickly, albeit beaching one of yours in the process. The main reasons for us not engaging straight away were:

a) We were in a leeward position and we knew some of you are good at leaking.

b) Quite frankly: You had to come to us. Our maneuvering was mainly in order to get the wind of you and keep it.

Had you sailed straight to the next circle we would have blocked you as best we could, brawling it out. It just wasn't necessary, though. I must admit, although it's nice to have Greg as an experienced commander, he comes in quite handy in a Herc. You can just tell him which area to keep and from there on no more management is needed 😄.

[vazco]

8 hours ago, Archaos said:

In the two battles you show here I do not think the fact that they were DLC ships made any difference as the same could have been achieved with fast Princes or Mercs

That's not true, as in order to counter Le Requin you need another Le Requin. It would obliterate a Prince or a Merc.

If Merc or a Prince could be used to counter, it would be ok. Kiting is one problem, DLC ships in PB's is another.

 

For kiting itself there are great counters - bring 2-3 frigates and chain/demast Prince or a Merc. That's why it wasn't a thing until Le Requins showed up.

[Tom Farseer]

It takes a good captain to do so, but a well built and well steered Niagara can go toe to toe with a Xebec. The Req will have the better cards overall, true. But it is not unbeatable. You will of course have to avoid boarding, where the crew difference really gets into play.

[Christoph]

@admin

change br for the dlc ships. 

herc 250

requin 200

this is the fastest solution to have less dlc ships in the pb

[vazco]

19 minutes ago, Tom Farseer said:

It takes a good captain to do so, but a well built and well steered Niagara can go toe to toe with a Xebec. The Req will have the better cards overall, true. But it is not unbeatable. You will of course have to avoid boarding, where the crew difference really gets into play.

Sure. As long as you mitigate for the fact that Xebec has 20% more guns on broadsides, has both stern/bow chasers, won't loose speed like you when you destroy it's bowsprit, that it's faster than you, that you need to demast it three times instead of once, that it can't be graped when being upwind like you can be, and that he has way more crew than you, I think you're actually fine.

 

Personally I'd rather try my luck in a Bellona against a Victory.

Edited July 12, 2018 by vazco

[Archaos]

1 hour ago, vazco said:

That's not true, as in order to counter Le Requin you need another Le Requin. It would obliterate a Prince or a Merc.

If Merc or a Prince could be used to counter, it would be ok. Kiting is one problem, DLC ships in PB's is another.

 

For kiting itself there are great counters - bring 2-3 frigates and chain/demast Prince or a Merc. That's why it wasn't a thing until Le Requins showed up.

The point I am making is that the fact that they are DLC ships makes no difference. If the Le Requin was craftable in game would that make it okay then? To counter a L'Ocean you need another L'Ocean, so does that mean they too should be banned from port battles?

Don't get me wrong I think the Le Requin is OP and there are many issues with it, but just banning it from port battles is not the solution.

[vazco]

34 minutes ago, Archaos said:

The point I am making is that the fact that they are DLC ships makes no difference. If the Le Requin was craftable in game would that make it okay then? To counter a L'Ocean you need another L'Ocean, so does that mean they too should be banned from port battles?

Don't get me wrong I think the Le Requin is OP and there are many issues with it, but just banning it from port battles is not the solution.

I understand your point. Yes, it Requin was balanced and wouldn't extend strategical options for PB's, in my opinion it could stay in port battles. I think it's just hard, if not impossible, to ensure this, and that's why it's probably safer to disclude them from PB's altoghether. I agree that they should be also balanced.

 

In the same time I think that eg. 1st rates are way more balanced than 6th rates. L'Ocean is a good all-around ship. Santi is great for experienced players who know how to not take damage, and gives more firepower, however at an increased risk of taking in a lot of damage in case of a mistake. Victory is the fastest and as such is a special purpose 1st rate right now - eg. great for screening, for support roles, fighting 2nd rates etc.

eg. I think that if any of the 1st rates was a DLC ship, it wouldn't be fair, as it gives side with more paying players an advantage of being able to use strategy that other side can't use.

 

[Guest]

8 hours ago, HachiRoku said:

 

Remove 3 circle system and replace it with 1 circle.  In the past there was no shore and circle was way bigger so if you were lucky you could kite all day in port battles. I believe 1 circle could force actual battles but the one issue it has is that most would just take a full meta ship setup. The reason for this of course is that armor thickness on oceans is still to much. Until 9 pounders pen all ships at a good angles at 250m there will always be a retarded ocean meta. Santis hull is older model and therefore flat and that makes bouncing harder for example but armor of the 2 ships still being the same obviously breaks the Santis in comparison. 

 

 

I don't agree with the 1 circle solution - then why have circles at all and not just force the players to slug it out?... In my opinion kiting is a valid tactic at certain stages of the PB, something that the opponent needs to be able to prevent.. Ofcourse with chain limits the advantage atm will be with the kiters.. Mostly those that complain about kiting are happy enough to use the tactic when it suits their needs, but as soon as they are "robbed" of a win it's a bad mechanic. I know Tiedemann and has never known him to complain unwarranted, so I'd reckon its a question of having no option to actually prevent/limit kiting, coupled with the Le Requin being OP with 80 BR to it's guns and crew compliment (has if I recall correctly more 9 pounders than a renomee and more crew to boot)..

[HachiRoku]

9 minutes ago, Lars Kjaer said:

I don't agree with the 1 circle solution - then why have circles at all and not just force the players to slug it out?... In my opinion kiting is a valid tactic at certain stages of the PB, something that the opponent needs to be able to prevent.. Ofcourse with chain limits the advantage atm will be with the kiters.. Mostly those that complain about kiting are happy enough to use the tactic when it suits their needs, but as soon as they are "robbed" of a win it's a bad mechanic. I know Tiedemann and has never known him to complain unwarranted, so I'd reckon its a question of having no option to actually prevent/limit kiting, coupled with the Le Requin being OP with 80 BR to it's guns and crew compliment (has if I recall correctly more 9 pounders than a renomee and more crew to boot)..

"conquest" works for battlefield because there is no wind and movement is way faster. I never thought the 3 circle system was good because the attacker should smash the defender. People loose defensive port battles without losing a ship because of bad wind. 

[NethrosDefectus]

15 hours ago, Tiedemann said:

11.06.18 we had 2 pbs. And I'm a gentleman, so I'm not going to name anyone, because I have pictures!  So from my extremely partial view: the defenders where basically just avoiding combat with their main fleet, while they had several premium ships to harass the attackers players in the circles and there by denying attacker points in the process.

As you all can see we also use the premium ships, but it is necessary now to be compatible in RvR.

Don't give us that "we only did it because they did it" crap, you would've brought them no matter what we used. AND you would've used them in EXACTLY  the same way if you had been defending.

As for us "avoiding combat", you were upwind for a good portion of the battle and I'm not sure if you've ever tried to charge the enemy upwind in lineships but it is near impossible. You on the other hand had the wind for a good portion of the battle but chose not to charge us, instead opting to sit next to your Mortar Brigs while they fired at the lineships. 

So don't start complaining that you were somehow cheated or that we behaved dishonourably.

Edited July 12, 2018 by NethrosDefectus

[Tiedemann]

7 hours ago, NethrosDefectus said:

Don't give us that "we only did it because they did it" crap, you would've brought them no matter what we used. AND you would've used them in EXACTLY  the same way if you had been defending.

Yes we would use 1 or maybe even 2 Le Requin no mater what and before that we would use Princes. But we would never have brought Le Requins or even a Hercules into a deep water PB, unless we where not forced to adapt to your fleet setup.. This is the truth, I swear to god almighty!

7 hours ago, NethrosDefectus said:

As for us "avoiding combat", you were upwind for a good portion of the battle and I'm not sure if you've ever tried to charge the enemy upwind in lineships but it is near impossible. You on the other hand had the wind for a good portion of the battle but chose not to charge us, instead opting to sit next to your Mortar Brigs while they fired at the lineships. 

 Yes it's a PB and even though it sucks, we have to try to get the circles you where sailing away from. You know this and I know this, so I don't get your issue. If you had wanted to fight all you had to do was stay in a circle,  not sail away form it with your heavy ships.

7 hours ago, NethrosDefectus said:

So don't start complaining that you were somehow cheated or that we behaved dishonourably.

I did not intend to make you/GB the bad guys here, it was just very convenient. Those PBs we had against you both had an all time high number of premium ships in them. And because of it we are forced to follow up..

Edited July 12, 2018 by Tiedemann

[Bluetooth]

I like the new DLC route.....but there should be NO DLC IN PORT BATTLES EVER. 

[Chug]

 

While the Brits brought premium ships into this fight and they do encourage and exacerbate the problem of kiting in PB's. It is also the fault with the current design of port battles that makes this a bigger problem.

Case in point (see screenshot above): The Brits attacked the above port and then just proceeded to run for the entire time. Never once attempted to fight us. Just let their greater numbers and small ships cap the points. I and most of our guys in KOTO only logged on in the hope of having an actual fair fight (first time most of us have been on in a month) and this sadly wasn't to be the case. We didn't even fill our BR in the hope the Brits would actually try fight us for once. I don't blame the BCC (though i think it's a shitty tactic) but they just played to win and we played to try have some actual action (fun) and this is the result.  I wouldn't be surprised if half of BCC's side never fired or hit a shot for the entire PB. SO much fun!!!

Port battle mechanics are the problem and the premium ships just make it worse. 

P.S. Perhaps "Naval Action" should change it's name to "Naval Chase" seems are more appropriate name these days....

[Batman]

Just keep me out of this, I joined late and only came to shoot stuff, which I did 😊.

@Graf Bernadotte I would have sunk you earlier, but there was like three first rates in my way that would not let me get close to you 😉

 

[Guest]

24 minutes ago, Chug said:

 

While the Brits brought premium ships into this fight and they do encourage and exacerbate the problem of kiting in PB's. It is also the fault with the current design of port battles that makes this a bigger problem.

Case in point (see screenshot above): The Brits attacked the above port and then just proceeded to run for the entire time. Never once attempted to fight us. Just let their greater numbers and small ships cap the points. I and most of our guys in KOTO only logged on in the hope of having an actual fair fight (first time most of us have been on in a month) and this sadly wasn't to be the case. We didn't even fill our BR in the hope the Brits would actually try fight us for once. I don't blame the BCC (though i think it's a shitty tactic) but they just played to win and we played to try have some actual action (fun) and this is the result.  I wouldn't be surprised if half of BCC's side never fired or hit a shot for the entire PB. SO much fun!!!

Port battle mechanics are the problem and the premium ships just make it worse. 

P.S. Perhaps "Naval Action" should change it's name to "Naval Chase" seems are more appropriate name these days....

You brought a terrible set-up with nothing that can counter them. The goal is to control enough circles (2 circles) to gain points. You can't control anything but one circle with your fleet of slow ass first rates.

Edited July 13, 2018 by Guest

[Gregory Rainsborough]

You brought just big ships, you were never going to win like that. If it hadn't have been me in a Herc it would have been me in a Snow, either way you would have lost control of that circle and the guy in the Bellona still would have died.

You lost because of bad tactics, not DLC ships. I agree that DLC ships shouldn't be in shallow port battles, like the Requin but it is fine in all others.

You were kited by the 1st rates who successfully drew you from the circles. If you had stayed put you'd have been fine. The DLC ships had pretty much nothing to do with that battle except hasten the sinking of that poor Bellona you sent to kill me.

Edited July 13, 2018 by Gregory Rainsborough

[Chug]

Flinch, thank you man as you just perfectly illustrated my point. "The goal is to control enough circles (2 circles) to gain points.."  This is the mentality caused by the current mechanics that causes the kiting problem. We (KOTO) don't see PB's that way. We see a port battle as a "battle" an actual balanced team vs team fight. You've done hostility, you want a fight, were here for one lets go, fight to the death., best team wins. Not a "well you chase me and i'll chase you and we'll go round in circles capping points never firing a shot..." but hey we won! yay us.

In short we want to have some action and some fun. taking/defending the port matters not at all to us. The game has to much tag/chase/tag/chase game play as it is and port battles should not be that. Clue is kind of in the name, port "battle".

Quote

 

You brought just big ships, you were never going to win like that. If it hadn't have been me in a Herc it would have been me in a Snow, either way you would have lost control of that circle and the guy in the Bellona still would have died.

You lost because of bad tactics, not DLC ships. I agree that DLC ships shouldn't be in shallow port battles, like the Requin but it is fine in all others.

 

Greg, if you re-read what wrote i never mention that we lost the PB because of premium ships. PB mechanics are the problem, premium ships just make it worse by encouraging the kite mechanic and we don't care about the loss of the port or the port battle we care about the loss at a chance of a proper fight.

Edited July 13, 2018 by Chug

[Guest]

1 minute ago, Chug said:

Flinch, thank you man as you just perfectly illustrated my point. "The goal is to control enough circles (2 circles) to gain points.."  This is the mentality caused by the current mechanics that causes the kiting problem. We (KOTO) don't see PB's that way. We see a port battle as a "battle" an actual balanced team vs team fight. You've done hostility, you want a fight, were here for one lets go, fight to the death., best team wins. Not a "well you chase me and i'll chase you and we'll go round in circles capping points never firing a shot..." but hey we won! yay us.

In short we want to have some action and some fun. taking/defending the port matters not at all to us. The game has to much tag/chase/tag/chase game play as it is and port battles should not be that. Clue is kind of in the name, port "battle".

No idiot. I'm not making your point. If you want a 'battle' then contest during the hostility missions. If you want a PB that requires strategy, prepare for that strategy. You probably could've downgraded to a fleet full of bellonas instead with a few requins in support, you could split your fleet between two points and win. Their ships are not going to touch a couple bellonas in a circle.

I'm telling you your philosophy is plain wrong.