Captain's Log 23: Setting A Course

8 minutes ago, Raine said:

 

On Lawless, you might be able to drop a foundation and a resource box to collect your week's worth of mats, not a bad idea.  I'm not a ship builder, but I don't think all the mat requirements are revealed at the start, so you can't be sure you have what you need to achieve your next ship within a 4-hour demolishable shipyard timeframe.  Of course, you could rely on Wiki IF the mats are posted, but then you have to cross your fingers that whoever posted them was correct, and that the devs haven't switched it up in the meantime.

Ramshackle sloops aren't a terrible idea, but will they hold the mats required for a brig or a galleon PLUS the corresponding shipyard if that's what you decide you're building?  I suspect not, but I haven't done the math.

As for pillaring the ships in, the pillars were topped with rambling stone platforms and we tested whether the collision on them had been removed from the game.  I can confirm that at least on PvE, it has not.  Collision on pillars and platforms placed in the water is still a thing.  It still allows malicious gameplay on a PvE server.

The wiki information regarding ships is extremely accurate, and all the materials are on the pieces when you unlock the recipes.  Calculating out the materials ahead of time is how I've done every ship I've buil, and I've built a lot of ships.

And no, you wouldn't be going directly from Ramshakle to Galleon.  Build a schooner in between.  A schooner can hold an entire Galleon prefab. Or find a lawless island that isn't the living embodiment of hell.  I am curious how you found ones that were so bad, the entire time we played we never came across a lawless that was as bad as the barren hellscapes you described, and if we have we would have sailed to another island before bothering to set up shop. 

1 minute ago, Archsenex said:

And no, you wouldn't be going directly from Ramshakle to Galleon.  Build a schooner in between.  A schooner can hold an entire Galleon prefab. Or find a lawless island that isn't the living embodiment of hell.  I am curious how you found ones that were so bad, the entire time we played we never came across a lawless that was as bad as the barren hellscapes you described, and if we have we would have sailed to another island before bothering to set up shop.

You might need to replace a galleon or brig which was destroyed, so without a base a ramshackle sloop (unleveled for weight) might have to hold all parts for the galleon and its superstructure as well as the upgraded (and mat-heavy?) upgraded shipyard.  Perhaps it will be possible.  We don't know til the devs reveal more of their shipyard revamp.

As for the hellscapes, those are real.  The most barren one I described was quite pristine when we first built on it at the Break of Atlas's Dawn.  Months later, it has become a wasteland barren of all life except inert foundations, pillars and broken structures.  That's what will happen globally on PvE over time if all servers become Lawless.  Still not convinced lawless is a better choice.

33 minutes ago, Raine said:

You might need to replace a galleon or brig which was destroyed, so without a base a ramshackle sloop (unleveled for weight) might have to hold all parts for the galleon and its superstructure as well as the upgraded (and mat-heavy?) upgraded shipyard.  Perhaps it will be possible.  We don't know til the devs reveal more of their shipyard revamp.

As for the hellscapes, those are real.  The most barren one I described was quite pristine when we first built on it at the Break of Atlas's Dawn.  Months later, it has become a wasteland barren of all life except inert foundations, pillars and broken structures.  That's what will happen globally on PvE over time if all servers become Lawless.  Still not convinced lawless is a better choice.

Is it possible we may be entering the .01% territory to be worrying about players who have not  only built a galleon, but also lost that galleon, and the schooner that they used to build it on, all while not even establishing a single land base?  And even then, they could still return to a freeport, get another ramshackle, build another schooner, and then another galleon.

Since the rapid decay of shipyards would be egalitarian, there would be plenty of coast on which to rebuild.  the materials for a small shipyard are quite modest, and large shipyards aren't that bad either.

You may be right about the 0.01%, but it's all unproven conjecture either way.

There may or may not be plenty of coast on which to rebuild; it depends on how the land rush goes, how many people are actively playing, how bases and related structures are built, and most of all, the decay timers on existing ships.  As you've experienced, in the present iteration there are far too many rafts and ships of all sizes which are sailed to landfall and then abandoned forever, whether their original owners continued to play or not.  I really hope those are given an expiry date for non-use.

6 minutes ago, Raine said:

You may be right about the 0.01%, but it's all unproven conjecture either way.

There may or may not be plenty of coast on which to rebuild; it depends on how the land rush goes, how many people are actively playing, how bases and related structures are built, and most of all, the decay timers on existing ships.  As you've experienced, in the present iteration there are far too many rafts and ships of all sizes which are sailed to landfall and then abandoned forever, whether their original owners continued to play or not.  I really hope those are given an expiry date for non-use.

That's included in the log, it's a tag system where they poof after a currently undisclosed amount of time.  The premise there at least is sound, and they can zero in on the exact amount of time during iteration.

Edit: And they should absolutely scale number of ships to players in company.  5 per player is probably reasonable, at least as a first value.

On 3/7/2019 at 7:59 AM, Dollie said:

The boat decay system will be enabled. This means that there will be a tagging system attached to boats which will cause them to self destruct after multiple weeks of inactivity on PvE, Golden Age Ruin, and Freeport servers. To tag a boat, the owner of that boat (single player or company) will just need to enter its stasis/render distance.

↑ That's what's in the newest Captain's Log re ship demo timers.  I'm partly cloudy on how the above bit in yellow is supposed to work.  We'll probably have to wait for a more detailed explanation from Jat.

Just now, Raine said:

↑ That's what's in the newest Captain's Log re ship demo timers.  I'm partly cloudy on how the above bit in yellow is supposed to work.  We'll probably have to wait for a more detailed explanation from Jat.

All that means is you need to go in to render distance for the boat to appear and its decay timer will be refreshed.

1 minute ago, [GP] Guybrush Threepwood said:

All that means is you need to go in to render distance for the boat to appear and its decay timer will be refreshed.

Ah...so, if your base is on the opposite side of the island from your ship, all you have to do is input some kind of distance measurement from your base to the other side of the island and you're golden?  Somehow, that seems sketchy to me.

2 minutes ago, Raine said:

Ah...so, if your base is on the opposite side of the island from your ship, all you have to do is input some kind of distance measurement from your base to the other side of the island and you're golden?  Somehow, that seems sketchy to me.

It's exactly like tagging your lawless stuff for refresh.  You just have to get to LOS to it.  Or just fast travel to it if you want to make things easy.

Just now, Raine said:

Ah...so, if your base is on the opposite side of the island from your ship, all you have to do is input some kind of distance measurement from your base to the other side of the island and you're golden?  Somehow, that seems sketchy to me.

All you need to do is have a bed on the ship, fast travel to it, fast travel back. That's all. Nothing sketchy about any of it as it is aimed at destroying boats left by inactive players.

I think the issue is that they've never really called that "tagging" before.  I'm guessing it's an internal word they haven't used much out here in customer-land.

Fast travel should be the only option.  Why enter some kind of render distance?  Seems unnecessary.  Or am I missing something?

2 minutes ago, Raine said:

Fast travel should be the only option.  Why enter some kind of render distance?  Seems unnecessary.  Or am I missing something?

I think you are.

The server automatically puts stuff that no player is near into Stasis, which unloads it from processing.  "Stasis Distance" is a very common unit of measurement, if you know the unit.  To refresh your lawless stuff, you also have to get within "stasis distance"

Just now, Raine said:

Fast travel should be the only option.  Why enter some kind of render distance?  Seems unnecessary.  Or am I missing something?

The boat simply needs to render in for it to be "tagged". That's it. You either fast travel to it for it to appear, or you walk/sail to it for it to appear.

2 minutes ago, Archsenex said:

The server automatically puts stuff that no player is near into Stasis, which unloads it from processing.  "Stasis Distance" is a very common unit of measurement, if you know the unit.  To refresh your lawless stuff, you also have to get within "stasis distance"

Hmm.  In general I knew this already.  But why then did Jat explicitly  state the player or company was required to enter the stasis number on any particular ship, if its value is already a known default? 

1 minute ago, Raine said:

Hmm.  In general I knew this already.  But why then did Jat explicitly  state the player or company was required to enter the stasis number on any particular ship, if its value is already a known default? 

Enter, as in "to walk into a location"

you have to "walk within this distance of the ship"

Alright, I'll go with awkward phraseology then.  So one only needs to enter the render range of ship in order to refresh its timer.   No different from the original dynamic on the claim flags on either PvE or PvP.

Yeah it's just the same as that.

2 minutes ago, Raine said:

Alright, I'll go with awkward phraseology then.  So one only needs to enter the render range of ship in order to refresh its timer.   No different from the original dynamic on the claim flags on either PvE or PvP.

yup, for now at least, you just gotta get close to your ships to prevent poofage, which for a first draft solution is A-Ok in my book.  I anticipate a 2 or 3 week timer

I think it will be 3 weeks as that is the timeframe they introduced the first time they did it for ships.

So back to Archsenex's suggestion of limiting each player to a total of five ships.  Can we prevent that from being gamed?  Do all the ships belong to the player or to the company?  Company governance would cover that.  If to the Company, then 5 ships per player wouldn't work well.  Recruit heavily, retain a large Company roster even if 80% of your players abandoned the game, keep their ships all over your island claims by doing bed hopping rounds every 3 - 4 days.  It's also a good way to keep large amounts of claims, since you don't have to correlate those to any kind of an active player base.  

 PVE side for this post.

  I have to agree with what Sadie said earlier .. K.I.S.S.  

  This new idea or system seems overly complex and based on smoke and mirrors numbers.   Island points and an undisclosed number of points/flags for companies, seems like this has not been fully planned out.  Sometime when this information is disseminated, it is done in a fashion like we should all just understand all the details.  As if we have been included in all of the discussions behind closed doors or in alternate communication mediums.   The more Complex a system becomes the more fragile it is, the more difficult it becomes to manage, maintain and support.  I have to stick with my initial thought of  limiting claim flags. 

  Two per person. It allows 1 to build a home on and 1 to ensure resources remain. Then a company has the sum of its members flags, a 4 person company has 8 flags. Give everyone 2 weeks to decide what flags to keep. One someone leaves a company than the officers have a week to choose which flags to release. 

   I would be curious to see numbers on players flags and what it would look like if everyone was limited to two and how much land would get free'd up for those that need it before adding islands... and then again after.   No limit on where they can be placed... just a simple limit of two per person.  Easy; to the point without trying to re-invent the wheel.

  You are going to rely on the players to manage the pillar, gate and foundation spam... and trust they aren't just going to keep an an entire island to themselves and destroy any and every building that gets placed?   That is assuming they don't work eight'ish hours a day, have a family and a life and only get a finite numbers of hours to play in a week and would be able to actually log in every 12 hours... so unless you're planning on stretching that number out to weeks .. it really doesn't matter.  it will be a gate, foundation and pillar fest.    

Just as I thought, they took the easiest way for the PvE claim system.  Take what they already have, and modify it.

I still think it's better than no claims at all.

One thing they didn't cover:  How are inactive claims handled?   

ie Someone claims an island, and than quits playing.  They had a tax bank and settlers, so the upkeep is met, but they haven't logged in in months.  Is there a way for the claim to expire?  Or be contested?

3 hours ago, vaylain said:

let the player community police ourselves.

Funniest thing I have heard in a LONG time.

I like the fact they listen to the players at times. But so the devs know, i think most of us care more about out character progress, maybe a little more than land. I mean if its a reset to where i have to redistribute skill points then ok i can live with that. But if i start out at lvl 1 again this game is over for me. If you find a way we can upload our character progress or anything like that I think it will bring a lot of people back to the game especially in PVE. I believe the loss of character progress is making most of the PVE and maybe other servers quit the game. I still play hoping I won't lose my progress but I am the only one on the server where my claim is most of the time and the neighboring grids. When I have to choose a new server I see no more than 5 people on One server and the rest have one person on them. I can almost guarantee as a player if you can find a way to save character progress it will bring players back. I really have lost the motivation to play or really do anything but I enjoy the game and the graphics slash beauty of each island. So if the character reset is a misunderstanding please specify. But if progress is being reset and we're going to lose all discovery points and everything please try to find a way to save it and maybe even save the game from dying out.  I'm in a small company but no one in my company but me plays anymore since the announcement. I will be happy to provide any feedback or input that is needed from a player standpoint.