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ATLAS

Captain's Log #41: A New Direction and Trade System + Ramming Ship Tease

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Ahoy Pathfinders!

After lots of internal discussion we have decided to start cranking out more frequent, smaller content drops rather than larger, expansive features that take months to prepare. This ultimately does not change our current feature course, but rather than wait for more content we are simply going to drop what we’re working on now - the first iteration of the Trade System next week!

How does this affect your everyday pirate life? More dev news - you are going to hear from us more often on new features we are developing. Faster content drops means more new features, but also more map wipes. Good and bad, right?! In the true spirit of early access (which ATLAS certainly is still in!), we are going to tell our awesome community what we are working on, ask the community for gameplay feature ideas and see if some of them work….not every feature we test out will ultimately make it into the final game. We might change our mind! 

Now without further ado, let’s talk about where we are at with some of the things we’re working on!

 :anchor: Trade System :anchor:

Since we first started on this renewed ATLAS journey, we have introduced Farmhouses and Warehouses into the mix. We have hinted that these were more than just a standard QoL improvement. We are building upon these features to develop a Trade System! 

We will be introducing a new structure, Markets, that are used to set up trades. Markets will need to be connected to a Warehouse, which in turn should be connected to a Farmhouse. Farmhouses are used to fill the Warehouse that the Market will use to look things up to trade. Markets will need to be placed next to a Warehouse and each Warehouse may only  have one Market. Players will need to control both land for resources and Markets, and sea for Trade Routes.

In the actual Market itself, players will have a menu that will allow them to set up their resources for trade and the exchange rate at which they will trade for. Players can then request trading routes with other Markets. Once the trade route with another Market has been established, the connected Markets will automatically set up the trades as long as both parties have the required resources within their Warehouses. A log is also available in the Market menu to keep track of trades, requests, attacks on your shipment.

A new island type, Control Points, will be integral to the Trading System. Each grid on the server may have anywhere between 1-3 Control Points that companies can capture for an advantage. When trade conditions are met, Markets will create a shipment of the goods. This Trade ship will automatically sail to its target destination, going through any Control Points on the grids that are a part of its route. These shipments will also generate gold for each party - the longer the trade route, the more gold is generated. Companies that own a Control Point can set a tax on any shipment moving through it. If there is more than one Control Point on a grid, the shipment will automatically choose the lower tax if available. If a company owns a Control Point on the grid, it will prioritize the company’s to avoid tax. Companies that own a Control Point can also choose to blockade specific companies from using its Control Point, making it possible for companies to stop trades between others. Players will also be able to directly attack any shipments en route as well. The trade will only happen if both ships successfully reach their end destinations.

Control Point islands will have a unique icon on the map. These islands will contain a central structure surrounded by canon towers. Players will have to destroy all canon towers and the middle structure where they will have to plant a flag in order to gain control. The structures will then rebuild themselves and players will be able to place the canon towers at specific defensive points and build other defensive structures around them. Control points will automatically start defending itself once attacked. Next to the towers will be the Tax Bank where the taxed gold is collected. Unowned Control Points can still defend themselves and will collect taxes into its Tax Bank. Tax Banks can be destroyed and stolen from. 

On PVE, no one can take ownership of the Control Points, so trades will always be open to anyone, however, the Control Points will always collect taxes at a set rate and PVE will also be able to steal from the Tax Bank.

:anchor: TeaseR: Ramming Ship :anchor:

A couple months back, we wanted to add an early version of a new Ships for Gold system. Upon reviewing Community feedback and further ideation, we took the feature back to the drawing board to further develop. With the next update, you may see a new NPC on an island. Although he has no functionality yet, we are sure that Pathfinders will be paying him plenty of visits in the future. 😉

The Ships for Gold system will be slowly rolled out after we launch the Trade System. While we are still in development, we wanted to tease the first ship that will be available for players to buy with gold - The Ramming Ship!

Teaser_Ramming_Ship_WIP_20201020.jpg

***The render above is still a work in progress and is subject to change. 

The Ramming Ship has a unique front end that is specialized for the purpose of - you guessed it - ramming straight into other ships! It features built in cannon ports and a lower deck with holes for oar boards that can be extended for a speed boost, even when there is no wind. Players can tactically use their oar boards for a temporary speed boost to increase their damage multiplier when ramming into an enemy ship! The Ramming Ship will likely not be customizable upon release, however, we are working on a modular customization mechanic for these new ships that can be bought for gold.

The design goal here is to provide an “Interceptor” option that can be used to catch fleeing ships or shorten a chase.

The current ship system will exist alongside this new ship system when it launches. However, apart from the Sloop, previous ships will additionally cost gold to build. Generating gold with trade routes will be integral to earning enough gold for upkeep.

:anchor: Final Note :anchor:

Again, we would like to emphasize that ATLAS is still in Early Access, meaning many things can and will likely continue to drastically change - even in the middle of development. Anything discussed is only up to date as of the moment it is posted. Features and changes that ultimately make it to the next patch may be different from what was previously discussed. 

As always, we appreciate the suggestions and feedback from the community. Please keep them coming!  We will be paying extra attention to your thoughts on the upcoming Trade System and Ships for Gold, and will continue to make adjustments as necessary. Thank you for all of your support! 🙂
 

:wheel:

Happy Sailing,

- ATLAS Crew

:skull: For the latest dispatch on #playATLAS keep yer one good eye trained on this here information :skull:

Natter n' chatter on Discord: https://discord.gg/playatlas
Hear ye, hear ye on Twitterhttps://twitter.com/sailtheatlas
Watch us scallywags on Twitch: http://twitch.tv/sailtheatlas
Plus ye can band with us Pirates on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/playatlasgame


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The devs are still alive, mateys!

Alright, dev team! A flippin' ramming ship! Beautiful! Go go go!

Please just pay attention to us a bit. Let us know you're alive, reply to some posts on here every once in a while and MAGA!

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soo... bigger then Brigantine.. and only 2 sail? I presume it will be slow af..  what that larges on the deck on front? we are again able to place racks whit larges on decks? And will that ship be able to ram sotd? Too many questions.. waiting for new acusations for exploiting from players, who dont know xD.

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9 minutes ago, John said:

Make ATLAS Great Again!

Only way to get more players back is to undo the barrel bomb aspect of things and do a full blown wipe again...

 

But hey... who am I to say what they should and should't do?

🤷🏻‍♀️

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1 minute ago, Lolleray said:

soo... bigger then Brigantine.. and only 2 sail? I presume it will be slow af..  what that larges on the deck on front? we are again able to place racks whit larges on decks? And will that ship be able to ram sotd? Too many questions.. waiting for new acusations for exploiting from players, who dont know xD.

Of course it'll probably be busted one way or the other at first. Either too OP or too useless.

That's not the point. The point is that all my Twitter, Discord and Atlas Forums kvetching have finally lit a fire under their asses, and the dev team might start taking this project seriously.

All the new features are going to need tweaking after they launch. That's just how it is. However the ramming ship is at first, they'll adjust it until MAGA.

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I'm sorry to be so unpleasant, but do you ever look at your community needs? Do you not see what makes people leave the game even tho they love it? I can promise you it isn't the lack of rowing.
Or do you just enjoy adding things nobody has ever asked for, and watch as the fun this game still barely provides fade away from the three low digits worth of playerbase you still have left in here?

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I am still waiting, along with numerous other players who you Globally Banned recently for supposed "exploits" to find out why, or if we will ever be allowed to play again. We have still yet to be told what we did, or when this will be fixed or when we can appeal this decision. I have put in tickets, sent emails, etc. We did not intentionally cheat or exploit anything. We were all daily active players who love your game. Most of us are XBOX players who chat and played the game daily with friends. We were merged into in a large company, of which you banned every member. We just want to be able to play your game again, and we did not cheat or exploit anything on purpose or know anyone who did. Whatever action you took on all of us was way over board. Still love your game, and wish you all the best. Hoping to hear back from someone about this issue.

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Awesome! Keep pushing in the right direction team Atlas! Though i hope you also address more bugs and glitches/optimization please! Like maybe show a "before/after" so the community understands your actually working hard to fix the game itself. These new features sound great though!

 

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3 minutes ago, ma1ne event said:

I am still waiting, along with numerous other players who you Globally Banned recently for supposed "exploits" to find out why, or if we will ever be allowed to play again. We have still yet to be told what we did, or when this will be fixed or when we can appeal this decision. I have put in tickets, sent emails, etc. We did not intentionally cheat or exploit anything. We were all daily active players who love your game. Most of us are XBOX players who chat and played the game daily with friends. We were merged into in a large company, of which you banned every member. We just want to be able to play your game again, and we did not cheat or exploit anything on purpose or know anyone who did. Whatever action you took on all of us was way over board. Still love your game, and wish you all the best. Hoping to hear back from someone about this issue.

Oof. That sounds brutal, m8.

2 minutes ago, Lord Vuldykk said:

Awesome! Keep pushing in the right direction team Atlas! Though i hope you also address more bugs and glitches/optimization please! Like maybe show a "before/after" so the community understands your actually working hard to fix the game itself. These new features sound great though!

 

"before/after' = very good idea.

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no ones needing ramming boats, one barrel ship can wipe out ANY boat in one shot.

game still sounds fucked beyond belief

already quit this season (like many others), maybe next time eh?

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Unless you remove the barrels from ships and all the other barrel changes made with that update no one is coming back.  So many people are waiting for this to be fixed so they can return to Atlas.

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surely you and the other devs can see the constant outcry about the barrels yet its ignored every time
"As always, we appreciate the suggestions and feedback from the community. Please keep them coming! We will be paying extra attention to your thoughts "
total BS, that meta has killed the game, would love to see the actual player count drop off of that week.

no ones needing ramming boats, one barrel ship can wipe out ANY boat in one shot.

game still sounds fucked beyond belief

already quit this season (like many others), maybe next time eh?

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You guys should try and focus on releasing this game. These additions are good but doesn’t seem like your getting any closer with release.

Maybe just add a few things to make the game ready for release rather going “back to the drawing board” on a game that’s over two years old. 

 

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The ideas are all focused on PvP, the PVE servers are very bad.
You need to improve the quality of the servers, what’s the use of having a game, if players can’t play without disconnect, many servers whas crash the game when this very full. 

I'm really sad, because we lost time, at the beginning after wipe, we even managed to play, but then when the server has more constructions, we have many problems that hinder the experience.

 

Despite the problems, I appreciate the efforts in bringing new updates.

 

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Two questions-

 

1.  Will there be a wipe corresponding with this update?

2. Will the wipe include unofficial?

I ask because I quit PVP S4 and moved to unofficial.  A lot of islands were removed from the game necessitating a wipe on all unofficial servers which was unaccounted for.

With regard to barrel bombs, they severely broke the game.  I think they should be shut down and maybe gliders too.  Probably and unpopular opinion on gliders, but hell if you want to give us flight let us train Pteradons and build airships.  

That being said the size of the map/vrs. number of players you want to attract is mainly what ended it for me.  By day 3 of Season 4, almost all of the islands were claimed by mostly the same companies from Season 3.  The gold cost reduction to maintain an island made this inevitable.  So my company was relegated to being settlers and paying draconian tax which inhibited our ability to produce.

Anyways, I am happy that you guys are still working the game!

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can you guys create a commit list similar to facepunch so that the community knows what you guys are doing and you guys can see what the community thinks of it you would get a lot less people crying and it would be a nice change of pace to see what grapeshot is doing :)

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My company of 40+ members quit this season because of Barrel Bombs and lack of Dev communication on the subject. Nothing changed and guess we aint coming back.

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In my opinion, having ships cost gold to build is going to cause a huge disparity between small groups and larger groups. Typically, gold is a big deal to smaller companies. So if you have a ship cost 500 gold to make it, you're discouraging newer players/small groups from being able to make and try all of the ship types. On top of that, they're very likely to lose boats more easily (since they don't have as much experience, or as large of a fleet to take a fight). So they'll be having to build more boats. All I can imagine is that it's going to run small companies out of gold very quickly, forcing them to be stuck using sloops (which are terrible). I would highly suggest re-thinking this change.

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All of this is great grand and wonderful but when are we going to get other building styles other than Thatch, Wood and Stone? I am a builder and would prefer some other options for building styles similar to what Conan has to offer. Also, when there is another wipe, please announce it with a little more of a notice this time.

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27 minutes ago, halebop12 said:

In my opinion, having ships cost gold to build is going to cause a huge disparity between small groups and larger groups. Typically, gold is a big deal to smaller companies. So if you have a ship cost 500 gold to make it, you're discouraging newer players/small groups from being able to make and try all of the ship types. On top of that, they're very likely to lose boats more easily (since they don't have as much experience, or as large of a fleet to take a fight). So they'll be having to build more boats. All I can imagine is that it's going to run small companies out of gold very quickly, forcing them to be stuck using sloops (which are terrible). I would highly suggest re-thinking this change.

"We here at GrapeShot have listened to your comments, and we will not be taking your thoughts into consideration. Instead, here's some more barrels. Thank you for your continued loyalty. Argggh!"

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