Seasonal Update: Treacherous Waters - Preliminary information

[chagadiel]

this is already being abused. pirate players parked at the wind tab able to click on it and chase down their prey who are directly heading to them. most idiotic implement i have seen ever.  i think

[toblerone]

 

47 minutes ago, Brig at sea said:

Speeds are doubled, rewards are halved. Pretty simple math, I recon.

Or the whole wind stuff is just a stealth nerf for the doubloons loot of delivery missions, so that the game will be even more grindy than now.

It seems that Devs are entering in "deflation mode" once more … and old testers know quite well what deflation usually brings to the game

[Sir Max Magic]

Dont know whether it has been mentionend before:

Can it be that there are no trading rewards with Dubloons anymore ?!

 

...atleast i was unable to find any of those missions...

 

This would be another stupid decision to prevent the building up of PB fleets when the only income of Dubs would be the random loot out of sunken ships and those kill missions...  

[toblerone]

1 minute ago, Sir Max Magic said:

Dont know whether it has been mentionend before:

Can it be that there are no trading rewards with Dubloons anymore ?!

 

...atleast i was unable to find any of those missions...

 

This would be another stupid decision to prevent the building up of PB fleets when the only income of Dubs would be the random loot out of sunken ships and those kill missions...  

Let's wait for the new prices of pemitted ships .... and do not forget taking with you a can of popcorn

[Dread Pirate West]

1 hour ago, Brig at sea said:

Speeds are doubled, rewards are halved. Pretty simple math, I recon.

The reward was doubloons, not the reals. The reals were nice, but when were trying to get work done as a clan, we needed the doubloons.

 

1 doubloon was worth between 100 and 150  reals on the market. The high gain trade runs were netting 250k worth of reals per run, at long ranges. Now theyre worth what, 60k?

Fine, if thats what the intent is. But theres additional ramnifications: common upgrades are betweek 1k and 10k. Repairs are sold between 100 and 400 at the cheaper ports, or up to 700 or 1k at the more expensive ones. Those repairs cost reals to produce, and for things like hull repairs, youre making near zero profit if youre selling at the lower prices. Near zero is fine if youre selling other stuff at the port and enticing players to buy your stuff with cheap repairs, or selling expensive repairs at those ports. Now those upgrades will be worth a whole lot more by value, but people arent going to be willing to pay the prices for it. When you need a hundred of each for a port battle, and youre buying them at say... 200 reals a piece... Thats a full trade run on just consumables, instead of consumables, and cannons, and a few upgrades. The players will have less to spend into the economy, which means less throughput of items and equipment being produced as economy players aren't able to sell their wares at prices that are worth the time and effort. Less economy, less ships...

This really seems like it was designed to slow down everything, and rather than encourage players to do high risk/high reward stuff, it shoehorns them away from the aspects of the game they were interested in, and which was rewarding for others.

A fifth of the reward for sailing, twice the speed available to gankers, with maybe a quarter reduction in time spent sailing. Remember, I have to sail out to the speed buff, grab it, sail into a port, and then sail back out of the port.

The calculus is heavily against anyone interested in economy runs.

[Sir Max Magic]

4 hours ago, BigWilk said:

If there was a timmer then there would never ever be any combat ever. It should just be areas of the map you get a boast or remove it.

 

You hit the nail on the head !! +1

[Guest]

Just when we're starting to kick serious Russian ass the rules suddenly change.

 

What a co-incidence.

[Aquillas]

I am at more than 60 knots, beam reach in a Lynx...

Some planes in Rise of Flight are slowlier.

@admin Please remove that as soon as possible. Please!

[z4ys]

Players cannot attack satellite ports but [Raiders] can. As long [Raiders] cant take ports (for 2 weeks) that aint a big issue but when they can conquer ports it means that every port needs a timer.  While satellite ports are most of the time non profit ports does it lead  to odd situations.

I dont mind [Raiders] attacking satellite ports but their attack time should be linkt to the regional capital timer except the satellite port has its own timer.

[Sir Max Magic]

27 minutes ago, Dread Pirate West said:

The reward was doubloons, not the reals. The reals were nice, but when were trying to get work done as a clan, we needed the doubloons.

 

1 doubloon was worth between 100 and 150  reals on the market. The high gain trade runs were netting 250k worth of reals per run, at long ranges. Now theyre worth what, 60k?

Fine, if thats what the intent is. But theres additional ramnifications: common upgrades are betweek 1k and 10k. Repairs are sold between 100 and 400 at the cheaper ports, or up to 700 or 1k at the more expensive ones. Those repairs cost reals to produce, and for things like hull repairs, youre making near zero profit if youre selling at the lower prices. Near zero is fine if youre selling other stuff at the port and enticing players to buy your stuff with cheap repairs, or selling expensive repairs at those ports. Now those upgrades will be worth a whole lot more by value, but people arent going to be willing to pay the prices for it. When you need a hundred of each for a port battle, and youre buying them at say... 200 reals a piece... Thats a full trade run on just consumables, instead of consumables, and cannons, and a few upgrades. The players will have less to spend into the economy, which means less throughput of items and equipment being produced as economy players aren't able to sell their wares at prices that are worth the time and effort. Less economy, less ships...

This really seems like it was designed to slow down everything, and rather than encourage players to do high risk/high reward stuff, it shoehorns them away from the aspects of the game they were interested in, and which was rewarding for others.

A fifth of the reward for sailing, twice the speed available to gankers, with maybe a quarter reduction in time spent sailing. Remember, I have to sail out to the speed buff, grab it, sail into a port, and then sail back out of the port.

The calculus is heavily against anyone interested in economy runs.

I applaude you for this extremly fleshed out summary +1.000

[Aquillas]

When a friend is kept in Battle, just wait outside if you have some Wind around, the enemy player won't have acceleration when going out of the battle. You can easily gank him. A couple of Rättvisans would tag a snow or a Prince...

[Sir Max Magic]

6 minutes ago, Aquillas said:

When a friend is kept in Battle, just wait outside if you have some Wind around, the enemy player won't have acceleration when going out of the battle. You can easily gank him. A couple of Rättvisans would tag a snow or a Prince...

...and "Prepared" is now a mandatory ganking perk so you can kill/wreck smaller ships with your first salvo even before they had time to react...when they shouldnt be in the battle at all...

Honestly, we the community took 10 minutes in the game to realize all of those bad implications...what are the Devs doing before they came out with those "genius" inventions ???

[Aquillas]

I was in Russian waters during two hours. Not a single correct PVP fight.

This patch is the most catastrophic one I saw in three years of game.  

[Sir Texas Sir]

5 hours ago, Spikes said:

The wind boost should be for traders only. Why in the world would you allow 1st-3rd rate ships to get uber speed boosts like that?

Nah all ships get to use it, but as I'll put below you shouldn't be able to tag while boosted or join battles.

5 hours ago, admin said:

Because warships are faster than traders and warships sail faster in wind gusts.. But the boost is equal for everyone you can use them too.
Are you AFK trading by any chance. 

While boosted you should not be able to tag or join battles.  That will solve the issues I keep seing folks bring up.

5 hours ago, Intrepido said:

If one side hasnt the boost, it is in disadvantage.

 

Remove ability to tag or join all kind of battles with the boost active and the problem will be fixed.

I would go as far as join a battle too so folks woulddn't be sitting off shore and use a boost to join a battle fast that some one else tagged.

[jodgi]

1 minute ago, Aquillas said:

correct PVP fight

What the hell is that, anyway?! And in a sandbox, even...

[Thomas Inch]

This update is utter rubbish and not what I paid for, its like playing pacman. 

 

[Teutonic]

To those saying cargo missions no longer give doubloons - not true.

Cargo missions still can give doubloons, but instead of 1,000, it is only 500.

Looks, lets be completely honest with ourselves, Cargo Missions were flat out broken and this nerf absolutely needed to happen. The biggest issue was that literally NOTHING else came even close to cargo missions in terms of making cash/dubs. The way they were set up was bad for the game and bad for game inflation. Lets not even mention that you only needed to use 4,000 reals to make a trader brig, you got 2 missions, finished them up and suddenly you made "roughly" 25-fold of income based on the cost of investment to do them (for mid-range cargo mission). If you had doubloons added to them and we regularly consider 100-150 reals the cost of the doubloon. you were looking at a combined "reals" reward of 100k-150k per doubloon mission minimum.

Don't come back to me and tell me that isn't Econ suicide right there. You wonder why the cost of repairs, ships, and goods are so damn high - well there's your answer, because it was so damn easy to make a crap ton of cash with basically free investment. 

There are a great number of other options to gain doubloons, missions and group missions to name just 2. Those even sometimes give you better rewards as well. The massive cancer that was cargo missions had to end at some point. Lets take it down a notch. We knew this was coming.

Edited October 22, 2019 by Teutonic

[Guruthos]

2 minutes ago, Teutonic said:

To those saying cargo missions no longer give doubloons - not true.

Cargo missions still can give doubloons, but instead of 1,000, it is only 500.

Looks, lets be completely honest with ourselves, Cargo Missions were flat out broken and this nerf absolutely needed to happen. The biggest issue was that literally NOTHING else came even close to cargo missions in terms of making cash/dubs. The way they were set up was bad for the game and bad for game inflation.

There are a great number of other options to gain doubloons, missions and group missions to name just 2. Those even sometimes give you better rewards as well. The massive cancer that was cargo missions had to end at some point. Lets take it down a notch. We knew this was coming.

they just give 500 doubs and are much more rare to give any doubs ... yeah the amount you could earn was too much but this isn't the way either ... i don't get why we need different currency's anyways ... let the people play like they want ... sinking ships ... selling ship doing trading should all be viable ways in a sandbox game ... 

[Dreadpiraterobertzzz]

The dubs nerf is all around bad for the game.   Not only does it greatly lengthen the grind for players who need dubs to build shipyards and level their crafter...   as well as reducing money that people need for competitive mods...  but it neglects one of the most important 'secret' functions of trade missions - populating the open world with players to kill/protect.   From a game design standpoint, lucrative trade missions were sort of brilliant - they got lots of players out in the water, which drew out gankers, which drew out response fleets.   It created organic motivation for combat.  If less players are running missions, you've eliminated more content than just the boring trade mission part, you've eliminated entire roles that players were playing.  

The loki rune has further hurt 'the grind' because now players are going to be more reticent to grind against AI, since sometimes they get smarter and less predictable.   A player who might have considered 3 3rd rates right at the edge of what they could handle alone will now pass on that tag, because they don't want to risk their 1st rate if the AI suddenly 'wakes up' and gets tougher.   So the 'just go fight for dubs' answer is made more grindy because now instead of attacking 3rd rates, this player is going to only go for 4th rates..  so they go longer between battles and get lower rewards.  

If the devs want to eliminate all organic combat other than pvp in the patrol zone, just go back to lobby/arena battles.   But they steadfastly refuse to do that...  while still making all of the other parts of the game less and less enjoyable.   

[Aquillas]

3 minutes ago, jodgi said:

What the hell is that, anyway?! And in a sandbox, even...

Some fight in which you prepare the tag, without being at 100 knots or more, having time to look around, place yourself, counter enemy maneuvres. Just for the start.

In one battle, I just reflex tag, due to speed and got my 7th rate in the middle of four 3rd rates, plus an enemy player...

[Teutonic]

6 minutes ago, Guruthos said:

they just give 500 doubs and are much more rare to give any doubs ... yeah the amount you could earn was too much but this isn't the way either ... i don't get why we need different currency's anyways ... let the people play like they want ... sinking ships ... selling ship doing trading should all be viable ways in a sandbox game ... 

If I was the one that could make the decision.

I would make all passenger delivery missions doubloon rewards only (like how they used to be).

On the subject of multiple currency types, I dislike the 4 system we have and would very much be keen on lowering it.

[Aquillas]

3 minutes ago, Teutonic said:

On the subject of multiple currency types, I dislike the 4 system we have and would very much be keen on lowering it.

Once again, developpers are facing the impossibility to balance 4 not exchangable currencies (except on the "black market") in the same game.

In the Age of Sails, all currencies were exchangable: the weigth of gold, silver or bronze.

Edited October 22, 2019 by Aquillas

[Dread Pirate West]

9 minutes ago, Teutonic said:

Lets not even mention that you only needed to use 4,000 reals to make a trader brig, you got 2 missions, finished them up and suddenly you made "roughly" 25-fold of income based on the cost of investment to do them (for mid-range cargo mission). If you had doubloons added to them and we regularly consider 100-150 reals the cost of the doubloon. you were looking at a combined "reals" reward of 100k-150k per doubloon mission minimum.

Don't come back to me and tell me that isn't Econ suicide right there. You wonder why the cost of repairs, ships, and goods are so damn high - well there's your answer, because it was so damn easy to make a crap ton of cash with basically free investment. 

 

4k reals for a T-brig
Is that... Buying all your resources from the market? Or Producing each one for your own use?
Are you accounting for the labor hours used with that run?

What about the cost of a normal battle, two players enter one player leaves, say solo Patrol? Two snows, each one about 5k to build, between 4k and 30k for guns (depending on your preferred loadout) and 3 mods. Each mod was about 20k, some cheaper, some more expensive. A loadout of repairs was about 20/10/40, each about 200 reals per

On the mid end, thats about 96k of reals worth for a snow fight.

Grab a trinc, do the math, what is the replacement cost for that trincomalee?

Your high end mission should cover the cost of getting into a fighting ship, not a percentage of one. We want more combat, not less. If the issue is doubloons being too lucrative for missions, directly convert them into reals for use rather than mixing them. Have passenger only missions which are worth 50 doubloons, and cargo missions worth 200k reals.

The economy was fine, rare mods were expensive and took investment to get. Cheap mods were plentiful. Building your own mods and selling them to the market was a good source of income. Now the available cash reserves of most players will have significantly dropped, which really does mean less overall flow. Less mods being built, less ships sailing the significantly less rewarding missions, and overall decreased economy.

Its not like the cost of production has gone down similarly to the average pocket book after all.

[o Barão]

Ok interesting to see port battles in the pve server , but i am still waiting for the AI agression to start a new game on the pve server.

[Gregory Rainsborough]

I for one am really enjoying the OW speed buff while trading. Makes these trips actually interesting rather than point and sail.

Thanks Admin! I like it for that purpose so far. Will try out raiding at some point to see how it impacts that.