Patch 30: Combat and boarding feedback

[admin]

Captains

Combat model has been significantly updated this patch.

• Damage is now based on weight and area of the cannonball.
• Inverse DPS issues has been fixed (when 4lb guns had higher DPS than 42lb)
• Issues with reload shocks has also been fixed
• Boarding combat now does not show you the enemy selection of the command
• Raking is more effective (artificial 25% structure damage by raking limit was removed)

Please report your issues with the new combat model (including boarding).
 

[admin]

combat is fine?

[staun]

Only took  one. Herc vs herc PvP. Damage  seams ok. easy to find out buttons.

Looks as it takes more repairs now.

I might be wrong, but to me it looked like taking mast down got easier. It Will take 2 mast upgrades to be decent safe. If the enemy have the Wind, better run. 

Ells it is what was told. 

 

[kitsunelegend]

AI seems to know exactly what you choose during boarding. Makes it very hard to get the upper hand. You basically end up just randomly choosing your options and hoping to win. Theres really no skill involved, its all luck.

 

Basically, not a fan at ALL regarding the boarding, at least against the bots. I really think the entire boarding mechanic needs to be completely scrapped and redone as a turn based RTS, maybe with ideas and inspiration taken from the Ultimate General series of games. This clicker based button smasher, rock-paper-scissors thing needs to go away. And the sooner its changed, the better.

[AeRoTR]

6 minutes ago, kitsunelegend said:

AI seems to know exactly what you choose during boarding. Makes it very hard to get the upper hand. You basically end up just randomly choosing your options and hoping to win. Theres really no skill involved, its all luck.

 

Basically, not a fan at ALL regarding the boarding, at least against the bots. I really think the entire boarding mechanic needs to be completely scrapped and redone as a turn based RTS, maybe with ideas and inspiration taken from the Ultimate General series of games. This clicker based button smasher, rock-paper-scissors thing needs to go away. And the sooner its changed, the better.

I know a bit about boarding (veteran level a bit  , but not veteran level very good)

It is same thing for me, I can kill the ai easy by boarding (can kill many in same battle instance as it is very predictable). You need know about prep. numbers, you need to watch your estimate of damage and enemy estimate (firepower and melee), then you exactly know what is going on.

@admin can you automate the boarding process, each captain selects limited cards according to his boarding setup, crew number, morale and prep. So it will be automated process with spice of card selections to accelerate the victory or get ahead in close situations.

So your crew will fight on it's own according to your boarding strength (crew/mods/morale/prep), you just influence the boarding. 

You should know boarding a Bellona is not a good idea, as it is a warship and her crew is not potato, even you have very good mods but with 250 crew. Also I suggest some ships automaticaly surrender after some point (you have 250 crew and enemy has fallen down to 50 crew and still fights, not real)

Dear Developers we have to sort out this boarding mini-game before release  , at it is current form it is still no go for me, easy to farm newbies.

[kitsunelegend]

18 minutes ago, AeRoTR said:

I know a bit about boarding (veteran level a bit  , but not veteran level very good)

It is same thing for me, I can kill the ai easy by boarding (can kill many in same battle instance as it is very predictable). You need know about prep. numbers, you need to watch your estimate of damage and enemy estimate (firepower and melee), then you exactly know what is going on.

@admin can you automate the boarding process, each captain selects limited cards according to his boarding setup, crew number, morale and prep. So it will be automated process with spice of card selections to accelerate the victory or get ahead in close situations.

So your crew will fight on it's own according to your boarding strength (crew/mods/morale/prep), you just influence the boarding. 

You should know boarding a Bellona is not a good idea, as it is a warship and her crew is not potato, even you have very good mods but with 250 crew. Also I suggest some ships automaticaly surrender after some point (you have 250 crew and enemy has fallen down to 50 crew and still fights, not real)

Dear Developers we have to sort out this boarding mini-game before release  , at it is current form it is still no go for me, easy to farm newbies.

I boarded an LGV while sailing a Connie. I have over 350 hours in this game, so I'm not exactly a noob either. I was able to win the boarding easy enough, but I still think there are too many issues. The AI reacts too well to your choices. It knows exactly what you choose, which makes it very hard, especially for new players, to understand whats going on. The goal for pve is to make things a little bit easier than pvp, not stupidly hard. Casual players are going to be chased away from this system and game with mechanics like this.

 

And I still think this button smasher boarding mechanic is terrible. It needs to be completely scraped and made into something different, like an RTS or something. It needs to be fun, compelling, and moderately challenging, but still more than doable.

[Cecil Selous]

25 minutes ago, kitsunelegend said:

I boarded an LGV while sailing a Connie. I have over 350 hours in this game, so I'm not exactly a noob either. I was able to win the boarding easy enough, but I still think there are too many issues. The AI reacts too well to your choices. It knows exactly what you choose, which makes it very hard, especially for new players, to understand whats going on. The goal for pve is to make things a little bit easier than pvp, not stupidly hard. Casual players are going to be chased away from this system and game with mechanics like this.

 

And I still think this button smasher boarding mechanic is terrible. It needs to be completely scraped and made into something different, like an RTS or something. It needs to be fun, compelling, and moderately challenging, but still more than doable.

Boarding AI is the same as it was before. At least on the testbed it was like that. Yes Ai knows exactly what you choose but If you know which action the AI usually chooses against a given action by you, you can easily bait the AI. Then just change your action accordingly in the last second and you are fine. For example use attack right at the beginning, AI will choose defend and then you change your action to musket fire or deck guns and kill a lot of crew. AI will usually choose fire grenades in the next move were you can use attack at the last 1 to 2 seconds. Granted you always have enough prep of course. It is also very predictable that the AI uses fire deck guns every time it is off cooldown, except you interfere with an early command by yourself.

Is the system great? No not at all and I also would like something much different but it isn't unpredictable or luck after you get the hang of it. But I agree, until then new players will probably become desperate at the beginning with reading all the numbers and not understanding what they mean and without knowing the AI behavior or seeing what the AI chooses and why it does it. How it works is not really transparent for the starter I can imagine.

[Guest]

@admin would love the chance of changing the broadside starting from bow/stern or random mode while in boarding

Edited February 28, 2019 by Guest

[van der Clam]

23 minutes ago, Wraith said:

This illustrates my point exactly. You have some of the best PvP'ers in the game that essentially fought to a draw knowing that at any time the smaller ships were dead. Do you really think Moscalb will come back out in a Trinc again and think he's going to be effective against a heavy frigate or line ship?

Nope.

If there is a gun weight disparity in battle then it basically just means the lower weighted ship will have to eventually withdraw or die, thus defeating any purpose of sailing such a ship other than to do tags, hold in battle, and kiting. This it just plain terrible for the game, and especially for newer, less skilled and inexperienced captains who might not have the best line ships at their disposal.

What will the person in the SoL come out with after he loses his SoL? With the new trading and resource mechs, I believe it will balance out. Even so, redii said he didn't sail that well and sounds as though he thinks it's possible.

[Neads O'Tune]

The damage output is FAR too extreme. 

Masts drop far easier than they ever have before.

Battles are over far too quickly

So far I can not find a single positive change in the new combat model personally

 

Was the repair cost deliberately increased? If so then all that does is prevent hunting because you have to return to port after every battle.

[Sailor]

1 hour ago, kitsunelegend said:

Kill missions are broken.

 

 

This forum dont allow off topic in feedback topics.
This is a combat feedback topic. Talking about missions is off topic. 
 

[Sir Loorkon]

Can I presume that it is not necessary to repeat constructive  criticism refering to the new boarding game in this thread when I gave it in the testbed thread? My points stay the same. I just want to avoid redundance and the pretence that I arranged with the new boarding game. I do not. 

The new damage feels good. Armor thickness is to low so angeling is much harder or impossible. Thickness could need a slight buff esp. because the turnrates where nerfed and the penetration got buffed.

All in all except the new boarding UI the changes feel good.

Edited March 1, 2019 by Sir Loorkon

[Tiedemann]

So far I like it, a lot!

[Hethwill, the Red Duke]

Is good.

Maybe decay energy a bit higher over distance, to accommodate for the faster pace of the game versus reality. That's all.

 

[Angus MacDuff]

Boarding.  UI is okay (just rock, paper scissors), but my complaint (its a whine at this point) is that its too easy to initiate boarding.  If your ship is rapidly accelerating from negative to positive, as it passes through zero knots it can get boarded.  It cant be just slow speed.  It must also be zero acceleration.

[OjK]

I really like the changes to the BR

All SOLs looks competitive now.
I just wonder - Consti goes out of its class by a lot (35% more HP than Aggie seems harsh)

On long cannons, statistically, balance seems interesting - it's really close with no "one ship to go".

 

With Carronades, the differences are much bigger, especially for Constitution and Christian.

The question is - will they ever make it to close range to get use of that extra damage with current demasting model

 

Edited February 28, 2019 by OjK

[Sella]

Let us lock/unlock gun decks. I had 2/3 gundecks locked before boarding and that prevented me from firing them throughout the whole boarding action. Or in some cases one of the decks is going to miss so I would like to lock it.

Also it's kinda annoying that the AI stills knows which command you are doing

[Hethwill, the Red Duke]

BTW, one detail

With the possibility of shooting broadside in boarding, please make so that the boarding is interrupted when a ship is full of water, or else it will delay as much as possible and keep broadsiding, when in truth it is already sunk.

 

[OjK]

3 hours ago, Banished Privateer said:

Santi is huge loser getting same BR again as L'Ocean, 900. 4k less HP, much worse hull shape (old model), no one will use Santis in PBs again. Should be at least 850. 

With current carronade Damage, Santi have actually 20% more damage per salvo. Santisima on close range will eat L'Ocean in no time.
And the actual HP difference is 2125 (including both armor and structure) which is less than 5% difference.

I find it a nice tactical choice now. No "one-ship-to-do-it-all". Santisima will be much better at close range brawling, L'Ocean will be much better on longer distances. 
So what tactic You want to use in the next battle? Making a selection of a first rate will also impact a playstyle now.

Of course, excluding Victory. Would be cool alternative, if not that god damn leaking problem.

We're going to wipe soon, so there will be plenty of occasions to sink all those ship on tests, right?

3 hours ago, Banished Privateer said:

Connie/US are big losers due to 400 BR, same as Wasa 400 BR (4th rate vs 3rd rate SOL). Also seems to be really high compared to Aggy. Aggy > Connie in most scenarios.

Connie has 35% more HP (almost 24k) than either Wasa or Aggie (18k total)

Edited February 28, 2019 by OjK

[Draymoor]

I don't understand why people complain that smaller ships can't just beat bigger ships... That's basically the whole point of the bigger ship existing in the first place, is it not?
I think the fact that speeds and turn rates will be modified even further will make it even better for those complaining about this, did you not see the damage from 1 stern rake to that Ocean?

[Teutonic]

Feedback on 1st day. I sailed mostly in 6th/5th rates for PvP.

Hercules with Carronades is absolutely bonkers.

Carronades in general for shallow water ships is extremely frightening.

At this moment I think I'd have to suggest 2 things, and to choose one of them.

1. Increase Ship HPs be the following
Lineships - 5%
4th rates - 10%
5th rates and smaller - 20%

OR

2. Reduce all cannon damage by 10% and reduce Carronade damage by 15-20%

EDIT: Everyone I have fought so far did NOT have carros against me though.

basically, if it wasn't for carronades I'd say the shallow water ships are balanced

Edited March 1, 2019 by Teutonic

[Barbancourt]

1 hour ago, Wraith said:

Just try to imagine yourself in the shoes of the poor U.S. players, who have no victory marks, and few captains with enough PvP experience to be able to field full fleets of first rates. There is no coming back from this change for them. And for new or casual players who can't afford to keep themselves in first rates after they lose the first or second one, or even multiple line ships for that matter, they will be hopelessly murdered all day long right up until they quit.

I've never bothered sailing fatties.  Am I doomed? 

 

[staun]

2 hours ago, Wraith said:

Just try to imagine yourself in the shoes of the poor U.S. players, who have no victory marks, and few captains with enough PvP experience to be able to field full fleets of first rates. There is no coming back from this change for them. And for new or casual players who can't afford to keep themselves in first rates after they lose the first or second one, or even multiple line ships for that matter, they will be hopelessly murdered all day long right up until they quit.

Think about the shallows where vets in carro-fit Requins and Hercs will destroy mercilessly the poor new players in their crafted and storebought shallow water ships. Their only chance with numbers is in carro Niagaras, and even then the broadside weight difference will still make taking on 2:1 relatively easy.

There will be no bridging of the gap between the elite clans swimming in doubloons and victory marks and the scrappy younglings who can make up for their lack of wealth and experience in numbers and swarms.  This was and continues to be a terrible change with respect to diversity of ships in the open world and the longevity of the game.

It is not all as bad as you say. New guys can also buy the dlc ships. Witch for gameplay, I just think  is a demand for new players. If they want bigger ships the Bellona can be bought for dbl. I know it can’t fight 1-2 rates, but still an ok ship to learn sailing bigger ships on. Think even new guys can get dbl. 

No doubt inexpirienced player will have a tough time. The new RoE for sure makes there life harder. Before they could even the field with Numbers. Those days are gone. Think we in the future will see lots of traps set.

Yes OW will see less small ships, but just stay in the shallow and you are fine. The game is keeping its route towards the “All for the elite”. Thats just means you have 2 choices, join them ore find a way around them.

I am in a small nation, not better of than the us. So I plan to focus on what I can do there. 

- Use my herc in the shallow to cap traders and get dbl.

- if fighting OW outside use a dbl Bellona, most likely with a couple of the guys I normally play with.

- I would think twich about witch battles to join. Yep proberbly not going to help out in a homeguard.

- RvR forget abouth it. All I need is being able to craft cannons. Maybe if we can find the players some shallow PB, but just for unimoortant ports and the fun. Will proberbly be in Herc and Lrq even they are not the best ships for it. But not going to craft as it looks in the near future. Not much fun in building Oak Oak ships, so are going to stay dlc and dbl ships.

- let the elite play on the Big scene. We can still have fun and who knows, maybe one day we will be better.

Edited March 1, 2019 by staun

[Barbancourt]

 

Well that's certainly a bleak image of the future

[Draymoor]

Battles end to fast, feels very arcade sometimes. The feeling of an epic battle is kind of washed down. I think the cannons modified dps is nice but the ships HP is too low for the new damage. I would suggest to increased all HP of all ships and all their parts by an average of 30%. 
Some ships BR is better now, but a few don't make sense. Santisima and L'Ocean have the same BR but the L'Ocean is clearly the superior ship, there should be a clear difference in BR. Same for Wasa and Constitution, Wasa is clearly better so there should be difference in BR. 

Side note: is it possible to add a tool tip that or add it to the stats of a ship, how many repair kits it uses each time we repair in battle? It would be very helpful, specially to new players.