Patch 30: Combat and boarding feedback

[Galt]

23 hours ago, Wraith said:

Another SoL of course. What makes you think that large clans won't have the ability to lose multiple line ships per person every day one we are a handful of weeks past the wipe? And if they can't, what makes you think they'll actually bother leaving port? That's the inherent problem with the new combat model: numbers or skill in most situations can't counter gun weight, hence you won't even bother giving a fight unless you have the bigger guns. 

This results in Naval Inaction.

 

It's almost like that's how naval engagements occurred in the real world (which is why the 3rd rate was the most prevalent man o war)

[HachiRoku]

36 minutes ago, admin said:

We dont disagree.. - need a bit of tuning. 
i am thinking slightly reducing penenetrations for all guns. 
increasing thickness (also slightly) 
and buffing 4th rates so they can stay in line at list for a bit.
and reducing carrons accuracy
 

 

why? i think its perfect atm. Top decks do damage. If you buff 4th rates please dont the connie. She fits in fine with other frigates so far. 

[HachiRoku]

What if you decrease carro damage a small bit and maybe even increase mass because imo its great that smaller calibers guns on top decks finally do damage. If carros are meta maybe just look at them because cannons feel really good. I agree that 4th rate ship of the lines need buffing but so far frigates feel so nice. 

[vazco]

Engagements indeed seem too short now. 

Demasting is also a real issue. Yesterday in Bellona I fought a herc, two Indefs and a surprise. I downed 12 masts with 70 mast hits, which makes it impossible to counter a Bellona even with many 5 th rates. It feels great when in Bellona, though it's a real issue. 

New players, having to sail small ships for some time, will have a really hard time leveling up... Please look into demasting, maybe give ships Mast mods by default? 

[Hethwill, the Red Duke]

6 hours ago, z4ys said:

Essex was armed almost entirely with powerful but short range 32-pounder carronades that gave Phoebe, armed with long 18-pounders, a decisive advantage at long range. For 2 ¹⁄₂ hours, Phoebe and Cherub bombarded Essex from long range where Essex could only resist with her few long 12-pounders

As I told on voice, the Phoebe was outside the reach of the Essex broadside.

Not outside range  ; she couldn't train the guns to hit the Phoebe. ( guess Porter didn't have Encyclopedia nor good books and mods )

Actually the guns that were hurting the Phoebe were 3 long 12 pounders moved to the stern, that Essex kept from her standard complement.

RL and Game do not relate because:

- Essex couldn't tack

- Essex couldn't make way with the light winds

- Essex couldn't go "upwind" to the Phoebe

All three due to the loss of the tops that afflicted her before the battle - she rolled so heavy that the gunwhales were almost at waterline with all the canvas open and BAM, the tops were gone.

That more than the gunnry decided the battle.

BUT in NA we CAN tack without jibs and we can climb the wind without tops.

Malachi example is more to the point of gunnery. I posted a example of carronade usage by British sloop-of-war HMS Redfin a while ago. They did use it close range ( else they would be shot long distance by the enemy longs ).

[Teutonic]

I think what admin said they are thinking of doing is actually a good idea.

I still slightly feel engagements would end too quickly, but we'd have to see.

 

[Rabman]

All of my top deck carronade ships were basically worthless before outside of point blank, now they all seem to pen at least from 100-200 meters, and not totally flat.

Generally battles feel closer to the old single repair battles; I like it. It definitely highlights the weight difference of ships especially in the 5th rate category, and the light 5th's need to run for their lives against a heavy 5th.

One side effect that I noticed is that with the massive HP increase came massive repair cost increase because of the current formula. My PvP built Bellona and Buc saw almost a double hull repair increase, 48 per I believe on PvP Buc with no hull/planking mods, 36 on the Bellona. Perhaps re-balance the ratio to match the originally intended model.

[vazco]

@admin There's a serious issue with being able to bow-rake Santi shooting at angles 0-70 degrees to the hull, killing structure without having to take down sides.

Bow-raking is better than stern-raking it seems, as you can distribute damage enemy deals to you when he stern-rakes, while he can still bow-rake at many angles. It seems stern-raking should be the best tactic.

 

Edited March 1, 2019 by vazco

[HachiRoku]

1 hour ago, Teutonic said:

I think what admin said they are thinking of doing is actually a good idea.

I still slightly feel engagements would end too quickly, but we'd have to see.

 

increasing thickness and decreasing pen will be back the the old system basically. 

[Cmdr RideZ]

It is getting closer to one repair kit system that we had before, I like it. If decreasing damage, increase repair kit cooldown. Can be that the old repair kits were still better but we are getting closer.

I like angling. Has to be useful, positioning correctly is nice.

Masts and sails should be strong enough to stand some time under gank fleet fire. Ganked by four, give me a change to fight before taking my rigging.

Edited March 2, 2019 by Cmdr RideZ

[huliotkd]

6 hours ago, admin said:

We dont disagree.. - need a bit of tuning. 
i am thinking slightly reducing penenetrations for all guns.  NO - only for carros above 100/120mt
increasing thickness (also slightly) we will go back to pre-patch situation - NO - maybe just 1 or 2 point each ship, not more.
and buffing 4th rates so they can stay in line at list for a bit. NO - they can already stay in line for a bit, players just need to lear how to properly bounce shots - to tank better, use a 3rd rate ship
and reducing carrons accuracy YES but only for shots above 100/120mt , under 100 they must fire as they do now (close quarters battle)
 

 

 

[Mr Pellew]

Soo another thing @Privateer can confirm: Muskets/boarding mods in general need a nerf. 

I boarded Privateer in a fight outside MT.

I was sailing an ocean with Marines 15 and Shooting and 1k crew. 

He sailed a Buc with Nassau Fencing masters, Redoutable Muskets, 5 rings, Marines 15 and Shooting 1-3 and about 800 crew.

1st round was me attacking him pressing muskets. I killed about 80 Crew and he killed 350 of mine. 

 

After that I  messed up and forgot to defend but the first round of that boarding shows the strory of rageboarding atm.

 

[Sir Max Magic]

8 hours ago, admin said:

What hmmm?

In  the Action of 4 September 1782, the impact of a single carronade broadside fired at close range by the frigate HMS Rainbow under Henry Trollope caused a wounded French captain to capitulate and surrender the Hébé

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Action_of_4_September_1782

 

Importance of the first shot is important. Position yourself properly, Get the right first shot and you win the fight. There might be some tuning here and there but we love it in general. 

not sure if it needs changing. price for carronades must go up. but damage not sure. 32lb ball is the 32lb ball.

Solution to the mentionend Carro Issues are very simple:

Just reduce pen values of Carros over 100 meters drastically and make them a brawl weapon only !!!

 

Broadside to Broadside carros will still be deadly and should be historicalwise...but as soon as you gain some distance, carros should just bounce off

 

Edited March 2, 2019 by Sir Max Magic

[Draymoor]

7 hours ago, admin said:

We dont disagree.. - need a bit of tuning. 
i am thinking slightly reducing penenetrations for all guns. 
increasing thickness (also slightly) 
and buffing 4th rates so they can stay in line at list for a bit.
and reducing carrons accuracy
 

 

❤️

[masterANDcommander]

 

On 2/28/2019 at 11:50 AM, admin said:

Labor hours costs of ships changed (drastically reduced for ships below 4th rates, slightly reduced for other vessels) more ships = more pvp 

I dont think this works as you indentiont. It doesnt matter how much ships i can build within a day because i can tow only one per day.So i dont have more Ships in combat Zone as before.

so more ship = same pvp

so i recommend increasing the amount of tows per day

Edited March 2, 2019 by masterANDcommander

[greybuscat]

You basically broke repairs. Increasing hold sizes would help, but repairs are so expensive already, you should just have repairs give more HP per repair, relative to the recent HP increases.

[Guest]

55 minutes ago, greybuscat said:

You basically broke repairs. Increasing hold sizes would help, but repairs are so expensive already, you should just have repairs give more HP per repair, relative to the recent HP increases.

They broke the repair meta - THANK GOD!

[HachiRoku]

8 hours ago, Intrepido said:

admin should do that in small quantities like 5%.

Its fine as it is. At about 200m 12 pounders were bouncing of @Liam790 victory last night at a good angle. Why would you want to change that? Do you you want 24 pounders to bounce? I have done plenty of battles so far and was bouncing perfect. 

[OjK]

I do hope, that players killing players in traders won't earn the Combat Medals.
And no, I'm not gonna check that out - not my type of "fun".

Otherwise, we'll be back at where we were half a year ago.
The smaller profit from attacking defenseless players was one of the best side effects of implementing Doubloons.

Now, we're going back to PvP Marks (just with different names) and farming them not by effort, but by sealclubbing again.

[AeRoTR]

4 hours ago, greybuscat said:

You basically broke repairs. Increasing hold sizes would help, but repairs are so expensive already, you should just have repairs give more HP per repair, relative to the recent HP increases.

It is not broken, ships have more hold now. So you need to take more repairs if you have bigger ship. 

A tanky L'Ocean now needs around 78 hull repairs per cycle, but hold size is increased so speeds are more or less same. But repairing is more expansive, which is very good.

A teak/teak Hercules needs 7 hull repairs per cycle which is similiar to old situation, which is good. 

[Archaos]

3 minutes ago, Wraith said:

Traders aren’t defenseless. Why shouldn’t they count as PvP? Best fun to be had is going out in a Trojan Indiaman and wrecking face with a full boarding setup against greedy players.  

The only reason that works is because many hunters expect the trader to be defenseless or manned by a player not skilled in PvP. Once a hunter knows you are armed and rigged to fight he will just keep you at range, wreck your sails and slowly pick you off.

Traders should only reward you with their cargo and not easy combat marks.

[Liq]

I like seeing the herc not being the imba OW solo raider ship anymore

[HachiRoku]

3 hours ago, Intrepido said:

I was talking more about carro performance.

Carros I agree with but it should be damage nerf because Carros already are way too inaccurate. 

[MassimoSud]

22 minutes ago, Intrepido said:

I still havent seen them. 

However I have seen in one stream how 3 frigates killed a captain in a second rate.

Given the new damage model ... the 2nd rate captain must have made a lot of mistakes!

[MassimoSud]

9 minutes ago, Intrepido said:

No, it was more a thing of carronades being insanely op.

With a single double shot broadside of a 2 nd rate you can almost sink a frigate today ... still convinced?

However I agree that the carronades must be effective only under 100 meters!