guns for new ships

[hoarmurath]

So,

 

If it was possible to rise every ship price, and sell them with guns... Because all newcomers make the same mistake... They get broke buying a new shipn then realize there's no gun.

 

Put guns on bought ships... please...

[SteelSandwich]

why is this needed?

 

I mean, you have a starters ship, a lynx, which is free to sail and free to repair.

(the fact that we have a yacht right now, is not the normal for future players, this is our reward for testing.)

 

Care to enlighten me how you can get broke in that situation? It's simply NOT possible, since you can play with free ships with free repairs to gather money.

All that is possible is that one buys a ship, cant buy the canons, they simply have to grab themselves a lynx again and gather the needed money

[admin]

The design decision on this is simple

Ships were built for shipyards and then had their guns equipped elsewhere. Very often the selection of guns (if of course they were available) was decided by the Captain. This is implemented in the game.

 

Most often than not this mistake can only be done once, and is usually done on light small vessels. So it is not very costly and you can make the money for additional guns in 2-3 battles. 

[LeBoiteux]

Problem will be solved by itself when there will be tutorials (with the final release...)

[hoarmurath]

The design decision on this is simple

Ships were built for shipyards and then had their guns equipped elsewhere. Very often the selection of guns (if of course they were available) was decided by the Captain. This is implemented in the game.

 

Most often than not this mistake can only be done once, and is usually done on light small vessels. So it is not very costly and you can make the money for additional guns in 2-3 battles. 

 

Then make it clear when they buy the ship. They need a warning.

[SteelSandwich]

Then make it clear when they buy the ship. They need a warning.

you WANT a warning, you dont NEED a warning.

EDIT: Like most games nowadays, it's like nothing should ever happen to a newplayer, its ridiculous. After 1 instance they know how it works and they will never do it wrong ever again.

Edited September 15, 2015 by SteelSandwich

[Konali89]

You get a warning when you leave port without cannons + it is a simple mistake they will make one time at the most. i'd say its fine .

[Jon Melkier]

I did it myself, before the wipe patch when I first started. Didn't bother me, I did as SteelSandwich mentions and jumped back in a free lynx for another hour

[admin]

I did it myself, before the wipe patch when I first started. Didn't bother me, I did as SteelSandwich mentions and jumped back in a free lynx for another hour

 

It happened to me even. But it only happens once or twice.

if you capture ships you never run out of guns. 

[Prater]

Yep, it happened to me too I think when i first started back in like April whenever they added me.  Mistakes are how you learn.  If you are protected from making all mistakes, then you never learn how to learn and move on from your mistake.

 

Perhaps an easy way to mitigate this would be to allow the basic 4lbers to be put on ships besides the basic lynx.

[hoarmurath]

It happened to me even. But it only happens once or twice.

if you capture ships you never run out of guns. 

 If you capture ships and craft, you're pretty fast out of space

[BobW-Bristol-RI-US]

Sorry, as this may appear to only be my opinion, but I would ask all to reconsider this for a moment...

 

Question: Because this has happened to virtually every new player, why isn't this viewed as a problem?

 

Everyone seems very focused on game details for the experienced player... when ensuring the game is extremely easy to set-up and get new players going / sailing / fighting / ship buying and outfitting... is FAR more important for long term game success than it's being treated right now?

 

If you want new players to like (and become addicted to) the game, it should be a '10 minutes to play, and a lifetime to master' experience. Not a 'go read the forums' and get back to me once you've spent hours digging out the info like I had to do... experience.

 

A 'right of passage' or 'mistake to not be repeated' for beginner setup and gameplay sounds an awful lot like an excuse for not fixing an obvious problem that (a) does not add to the gaming experience, and ( stings new players in a bullying fashion unnecessarily.

 

If the objective is to make game successful and sustainable... it would seem that fixing anything like this stuff that hits new players in an annoying 'why did this happen to me' experience needs to be ruthlessly eliminated from the game experience.

 

To the uninitiated (this is, after all, a game still, right?), the obvious question would be "Why in the world would a game allow me to spend my hard earned noob $$$ to buy a ship if I can't sail it and go do ship fighting stuff (no money left for guns)? Or allow me to buy cannons when I own no ships that can use/carry/fight with those cannons? This is not a naval combat simulator that evaluates and grades your supply chain / supply corps management skills. It is a game.  These allowable errors in my opinion are really dumb, piss off the new players, do nothing to add value, and should be eliminated ASAP.

 

From a UI programming perspective, fixing this so that the new player can't do something this stupid without a warning can be easily crafted without heavy lifting.

 

The other (related) real problem (which will hopefully solved in the final UI) is that the information (and functionality needed) to fix this is not intuitive or found in the game (ship/gun classes, costs, and loadout requirements) The game dev forums are NOT the game. I know they've added ship / cannon class info to the UI where the ships equipment is displayed - but these efforts should continue and be refined.

 

Lastly - moving towards release, please focus more effort on making the game better and easier for the beginner. We've been playing for months and everyone knows and uses all the workarounds for information not available to them in the actual game UI. Revisit the efforts on making the UI better and easier for the new and casual players. That is, unless you don't want the new players  (and game growth revenue stream.)

 

Regards all, Bob W (Muttley)

[maturin]

When the game is released, there will be tutorials and helpful pop-ups.

 

The first time you buy a ship, there can be a note on the confirmation screen reminding you that it doesn't have guns.

 

But now is not the time for such finishing touches. The 'batteries not included' thing is hardly the most confusing aspect for new testers. The game still writes 'yard' in Russian, for chrissakes.

[BobW-Bristol-RI-US]

Agreed - They may be finishing touches - just didn't want things like this to get lost (and fall completely off the bottom of the list to esoteric windage on chain shot in flight things and the like.)

[hoarmurath]

When a new player make the mistake and ask about what he can do on help chan, i'm usually the one who answer if i'm online. Not every player ask. It happened to me, and I didn't. Yet, i can understand their frustration and disapointment at having to return grinding in a basic lynx after having finally bought the new ships they were dreaming about since they started. And when i explain them how to solve the problem, some are amused, others are angry, and i can understand them.

 

Just think about this : they aren't punished because they made a mistake. There's absolutely no indication in the game that a new ship come without guns. You can't even know what guns you can put on a ship before buying it, so you can't prepare for the added cost. It's not a mistake on their part.

 

And most of them think "i'll put my old guns on my new ship"... It seem perfectly logical to them, and to be perfectly honest, it is. Just, the basic guns of the lynx can't equip anything else. Right now, a lot of new players, starting with the yacht equiped with this gun end up not understanding why they can't put back their guns on their ships after trying to remove them. Did they make a mistake? No, they were experimenting with the UI, which is perfectly normal. Yet they get punished for doing it.

 

I can understand that it's not high on the list of priorities, but i hope the issue will be thought about before game release. There's absolutely no point about letting in a game a feature that punish the player without him making anything stupid. Unless your game is about sado-masochism, then, it could be normal.

 

A simple solution could be to allow all 7th rate ships to mount class 10 guns.

Edited September 16, 2015 by hoarmurath

[Konali89]

you are mistunderstanding one thing helene, they are not being punished they are learning. If you want to become better at the game, you simply have to fail and learn from it. Be anctious why did something go wrong and work on it.

[hoarmurath]

But this is the point, they did nothing wrong. They would do something wrong if the information was available somewhere and they wouldn't pay attention to it. It's not the case, the information isn't available at all.

[SteelSandwich]

But this is the point, they did nothing wrong. They would do something wrong if the information was available somewhere and they wouldn't pay attention to it. It's not the case, the information isn't available at all.

The information IS available helene, there is a big message stating:

 

'Are you sure you want to set sail without canons?'

 

Care to enlighten me how much for of a warning players need?

[admin]

The information IS available helene, there is a big message stating:

 

'Are you sure you want to set sail without canons?'

 

Care to enlighten me how much for of a warning players need?

 

he is referring to a particular case

player gets 10k of hard earned money

buys a cutter using all this money

then finds out he needs canons - while he cannot install basic cannons

[Magnum]

he is referring to a particular case

player gets 10k of hard earned money

buys a cutter using all this money

then finds out he needs canons - while he cannot install basic cannons

 

Player needs to learn 10k is NOT enough - also needs 1.5k to 2.25k for cannons.

 

It's like sales tax.

 

Also a player should have some reserves for repairs.

 

------

 

It's like the player buying the wrong size cannons - oops, move on.

[Johny Reb]

I understand the frustration.It happened to me. Luckily I didn't loose my ship. But the irritation was just in having to leave a battle and return for cannon. I never made the mistake again.

 

Bob has a point. I don't think its good for business for new players to be frustrated so early in the game although I doubt this frustration will drive people from it. Its such a simple fix. I agree with the admin that the cannons should be a separate purpose, especially if cannons can be eventually crafted but a simple pop up warning a player is all that is necessary to solve this problem. Just put it on the list if its not already in the game.

[Prater]

Player needs to learn 10k is NOT enough - also needs 1.5k to 2.25k for cannons.

 

It's like sales tax.

 

Also a player should have some reserves for repairs.

 

------

 

It's like the player buying the wrong size cannons - oops, move on.

 

 

It's kind of like taking out a loan at your max expecting you will cash out on some investment and it goes south, and you have to pay up to the bank.  Never a good idea.  Always keep 5-10k in reserves people.

[ShiverMyTimber]

  Always keep 5-10k in reserves people.

I would say 10-20k would be the better number since then you aren't lynxed when your ship runs out of durability (a silly system, ships should have 1 dura and the option to insure the ship in port)

As well as keeping money in reserve do not sail what you cannot afford to lose. 

[ShiverMyTimber]

It is a mistake that will happen once. I mean, why should ships come with cannon? You're buying the ship, not a full armament. This runs especially true with the different gun types in game.

Possibly you could make an order (not a purchase, someone has to fulfil this order by getting the ship and guns together) on the market for a ship with the right gun layout for you?

Edited September 20, 2015 by ShiverMyTimber

[opis08]

Problem will be solved by itself when there will be tutorials (with the final release...)

Speaking of, when will this be? I decided to buy beta too late so now I can't buy it, and I'm really anticipating when I can buy any sort of version of the game. I couldn't find a Q and A, so I guess i have to ask on the forums