suggestion My thoughts on the game and what I wouldn't mind seeing short terms and beyond the 6 month plan.

[halofanjames]

So to start I guess I'll list of my thoughts on the game as of writing (yes I know there's a major patch in the works that'll render several points null) both positive and negative

- community feedback is acted upon in a very swift manner, I'm used to getting a hotfix a week later, not after I wake up 7 hours later. Nick you guys doin good over there like it's okay to wait a day to fix things

- Game feels better with each patch drastically

- Game feels pretty good all things considered, while it's rough around the edges I wouldn't have put 200 hours  in the span of a few weeks if I didn't enjoy the game.

- The pace of content has drastically increased it feels though I did take a hiatus for a good while before the full map release was launched.

- Everything sounds pretty good and particle affects are very nice, nothing hits the same as when you cause a flashfire and watch as a multi ton turret shoots to the moon with a burst of cooking ammo.

- Capital ship models are perfect there's plenty of national flavour for BB's hats off to your model maker he has a true appreciation for detail

- World map is very well modeled for the scale.

Now time for where I feel the game needs to be improved or feels unfinished and or gripes I have. ( note: the good isn't short because there isn't a lot of positives about the game, there are this game is genuinely one of a kind and I wouldn't be surprised I get over 1k hours in a short time) (second addendum a few of these are general issues in the field of game development so it will sound hyperbolic and I am functioning off of caffeine and 2 braincells.)

- Light cruiser and destroyers need to be prioritized for new hulls mainly light cruisers as they almost all use the same generic tower except a few examples I know this is being fixed next update for a few classes but it feels weird when the big three (USA, UK and GER) look the same for so long. As for destroyers let's say you're playing the USA and you unlock the 4k limit for DD hulls you go and check and...... nothing, the highest weight hull is the leader and I've only gotten it maybe halfway to the max limit so maybe have it so that leader hulls can go up to 4k if a more advanced hull isn't viable.

- Speaking of missing things, turrets, more specifically and immediately turrets that are missing for some nations/classes but are on others. The two most notable examples is the bofors existing for the French but not the USA as 2 and 3 inch guns the 3 inch isn't too big a deal as it's nice to see the 76 mm get some love but it feels weird the other staple of small caliber guns for the USA is only in French ships. The second example that I can pull is the Mk 5 3 inch guns (might have fudged the caliber but I know it's the smaller kind) on UK BB's is either that of the tribal class (forgetting the gun name even though there's one a 20 min walk from me) or is similar to, isn't on DD's but instead is the generic US turret, I know there's more example of mix mashed turrets but these two are the most noteworthy example that came to mind.

- Economy/research: this needs a good bit of tweaking, economy seems semi okay AI tweaking is still needed with it going bankrupt every other turn, on the whole research needs to be heavily boosted earlier start dates lag way behind in tech as it goes on in the years.

- redundant research: lets say you plan on only using a hand full of calibers it would be nice to target the calibers you want instead of going through every other caliber to get the mk 5's.

- Auto design and the AI: this is an aspect I understand more and more the further I get into coding and modding and the more I tip my hat to the fact you guys have reeled it in as much as you have (for those who don't know, AI and sandbox building is a pandoras box and always breaks) this is something that has and will improve over time and again hats off to the game labs team for having it in the state it is.

- Copy and paste nations: this will be controversial, Spain, Austria and China don't have enough unique hulls and components to really justify them at the current moment, again I stress at this moment, there are plenty of hulls and components already in game in early turns but as the eras go on they really lack anything that isn't either UK or GER components, now this is guaranteed to change and the state they are in now is likely due to how more of the major nations are being focused on (hot take, if that is the case I'm all for it.)

- Politics being bare bones at best and down right frustrating at worst: stated this in the hotfix topic but it feels like the government system and politics is immune to player input, now I'm all for the Idea of being a cog the machine rather than the big man in charge of the country and the tug of war it entails, however when I've been spending 10 plus turns to improve relations with someone only for it to change by 12 points and then the glue eating gremlin of an ally that hitched a ride from a prior war decides to fight the nation I'm trying ally with and flushes it down the drain, it makes me want to do Franz ol' boy in myself. Now my recommendation to change politics while still keeping the idea of being a part of the system rather than the head, is to have naval prestige mean something rather than random event currency that collects dust 80% of the time, have it so that the tiers of prestige act as bonus multipliers to political decision and have it act as an actual prestige system or even more basic just use it as a currency for political decisions (admittedly this can hamper the AI as it tends to tank in prestige hard in wars and can snowball but I personally would prefer this concept over RNjesus snapping my neck anytime I want to speak to parliament but let me know if anyone likes this and if any of the devs by chance see this let me know if it's even possible you guys know far more of the limitations of the systems in game than anyone else does or if this is already in the works).

End of the gripes really if I was on my home system I could probably find a few more things that could be retooled but probably by the time I get to it and find the big ones they'll be patched the moment I blink. Now onto the big asks and things I hope to see.

- 50's and cold war era hulls and ships: I would love to see the campaign go further, maybe not into cruise missile era but close to it, this leads to my next point.

- paper ships/components: can't put a name down to specific asks but to anyone who's played WoW you know the stuff I'm talking about.

- decorative pieces/AA mounts and superstructure changes: first two semi self explanatory, camos, AA mounts just stuff to spice up the models, the second is more practical allowing mounts of funnels and turrets without them looking out of place such and amidships.

- More freedom with barbette placement: somewhat annoying that only some ships allow side barbettes, it'll get weird but I'd love to make a Frankenstein ship of barbettes everywhere.

- Modding support: Self explanatory but a pipe dream and something that I think needs time but I can bet a good few bucks that this game could be like HOI4 in terms of a modding scene.

 

Rant over, would love to hear what people think of my incoherent ramblings and if anyone has any input on my observations and requests to the devs, speaking of if anyone on the dev team sees this would love to hear what you guys think, this is your game after all and I'm curious to see the feasibility of some of these points 

[ituralde]

Agree with most of this.

I think there's a number of easy things that would be nice to see out of this that would be easy in interim form.  

First, give us a checkbox to disable campaign end date. 

Second, constrain the AI design harder for campaign play, or at least offer an option for it.  End turn takes way too long.  Build in semi-historical designs based on each available hull and the expected tech levels, and have those as the basis for what we see on campaign.  Give us a checkbox to 'prefer AI historical designs' so the shipbuilding process doesn't drag the campaign down so much until and optimization pass can happen. 

Last, give me a checkbox to disable submarines until the implementation of them isn't complete and utter hello kittying RNG garbage that blows up battleships in a non-interactive way.  Finish the mechanic and we can revisit. 

Everything else on here is pretty much a longer term rework or requires a more direct investment of dev resources, but I'm pretty much down with everything else said here.

 

[Wowzery]

The one thing diplomatically I'd like to see is the ability to influence invading third world countries.  Like if I'm playing the US, being able to invade Hawaii.  Or if a major power dissolves and leaves a bunch of territories.  Would love to be able to invade those territories.

[halofanjames]

On 3/14/2023 at 12:27 PM, ituralde said:

Agree with most of this.

I think there's a number of easy things that would be nice to see out of this that would be easy in interim form.  

First, give us a checkbox to disable campaign end date. 

Second, constrain the AI design harder for campaign play, or at least offer an option for it.  End turn takes way too long.  Build in semi-historical designs based on each available hull and the expected tech levels, and have those as the basis for what we see on campaign.  Give us a checkbox to 'prefer AI historical designs' so the shipbuilding process doesn't drag the campaign down so much until and optimization pass can happen. 

Last, give me a checkbox to disable submarines until the implementation of them isn't complete and utter hello kittying RNG garbage that blows up battleships in a non-interactive way.  Finish the mechanic and we can revisit. 

Everything else on here is pretty much a longer term rework or requires a more direct investment of dev resources, but I'm pretty much down with everything else said here.

 

I planned this to be a somewhat longer term list kinda on a year or even more in scope as a lot of these have to be implemented gradually to gauge their impacts on the campaign and designer.

- Yes the ability to have forever games is something I think that needs to exist mostly to just allow the AI to catch up

- Subs are in a broken state no doubt, what I've noticed is that early on when they're fist unlocked they are far more potent than they should but as soon as even basic ASW mods are unlocked they become completely null and void with the only real use I have for them is minelaying as if a convoy has a single depth charge it's a suicide mission. In general I think there should be options to enable and disable features to augment campaigns to a players fit

[ozzy.88]

 

A lot of very good points!

I have another one though: introduce sort of 'national flavours' that would depict different nation's approach to naval warfare and make gameplay unique for each of them.

For example:

France - early access to quad turrets

Japan - early access to oxygen torpedoes of larger size

UK - better coal quality: +1 knot of speed when using coal or coal+oil fired engines

USA - better damage control

On 3/13/2023 at 7:31 PM, halofanjames said:

More freedom with barbette placement: somewhat annoying that only some ships allow side barbettes, it'll get weird but I'd love to make a Frankenstein ship of barbettes everywhere.

I would suggest a different approach: get rid of the barbette placement altogether and add option to raise/lower each turret you place on a ship.

[halofanjames]

17 hours ago, ozzy.88 said:

 

A lot of very good points!

I have another one though: introduce sort of 'national flavours' that would depict different nation's approach to naval warfare and make gameplay unique for each of them.

For example:

France - early access to quad turrets

Japan - early access to oxygen torpedoes of larger size

UK - better coal quality: +1 knot of speed when using coal or coal+oil fired engines

USA - better damage control

I would suggest a different approach: get rid of the barbette placement altogether and add option to raise/lower each turret you place on a ship.

The barbette Idea I think would be perfect, didn't think of that would allow for far more customization to ships