Vulnerability Timers and other changes to make Atlas strategy great and fun.

[Torch 16]

These are some suggestions to make game play and strategy work in such a way to make the game balanced, great, and fun.

1. Allow docks with vulnerability timers that players set. Create docks that have timers attached to them. You may dock any ship to the dock but while in dock it is only vulnerable for the 4 hours set by the company. Outside of those 4 hours the ship cannot be sunk and the contents on the ship cannot be destroyed. This will do two things:

1a. It will balance the game to provide a company time to defend their ships. And since Atlas is a game of pirate ships and not land based building (though that is part of it) creating timers makes sense.

1b. It will force battles and more battles at sea will take place as companies have to anticipate the timer and also leave dock to defend their ships.

1c. It will provide risk as to what you store on the ship to take advantage of the invulnerability timer (see #2 below).

2. While ships may be invulnerable when docked (outside the vulnerability timer) all land based fortresses are destructible and lootable at any time providing for offline raiding. If you choose to store valuable items on your ship to protect them while invulnerable, you also risk losing that ship and goods when the timer makes the ship vulnerable or if the ship is undocked to fight. Companies will have to decide how they store, build, and defend their bases. This will also allow a minimal crew, even one person with a well fortified base, to put up a decent fight or to be a decent threat. This way if an online raid occurs on a land structure, you don't need a large number of people online to put up a fight bringing balance to the offline advantage to the aggressor.

I believe these things would change the game dramatically for the better and create fights at sea. We want to encourage battles at sea, not boring destruction of ships while the ships are just sitting around on shore. What's the fun in that?

 

Edited January 28, 2019 by Torch

[LaiTash 156]

Freeports. Solo players are the ones who need invulnerability the most and they might not have a base to place a dock there. Small companies will be driven away from their land sooner or later anyway. Large companies are there for the whole warfare and empire building thingy, so let them sink eachother's ships whenever they want.

Make it so that you can only store a ship in a freeport if the total weight of cannons outside gunports does not exceed 5-10 percents of initial ship's weight capacity.

Anchored ships should probably have increased damage resistance as they are too easy targets now even with proper defences.

Edited January 29, 2019 by LaiTash

[Torch 16]

If someone can put a ship in the water then they could make a "dock". The ship yard can function as a dock I suppose. You want to build another ship then you have to expand. If you are a solo player, how many ships should we expect someone to manage and have access to without risk anyway? If they don't have a base to put a ship in the water then the point is moot as they have yet to establish an entry point into the game. So what does it matter?

 Sinking ships offline is the current content of the game, and the predominant content. Atlas is not currently a game of warfare at sea, but of stationary ship sinking along coast lines while people are offline. A game, whatever its medium or format, is only as good as the rules designed to force strategy and game play, not passive exchanges where nothing takes place. That's currently the majority of the content. I guess I don't get why that's so exciting and how the draws players to the game. Come, join a company, build ships, go blow up stationary ships, log off, get your stationary ships blown up, log on, build ships and blow up stationary ships, log off, repeat.

We don't want large companies to obliterate each other passively. It doesn't make for a good game that will last. We want large companies engaged in battles at sea and having to fight for what they have while implementing strategies to keep their "empire". Battles at sea, and large battles allow for others to join in, maybe third party, etc. There are all sorts of possibilities that would give entry points for smaller groups to engage in warfare and to do so knowing that they have some protection to continue. Currently my moderate group doesn't engage at sea, or is hesitant to engage while at sea, out of fear of retaliation when we cannot defend ourselves while offline, so we don't engage. We would be far more likely to engage at sea and battle at sea knowing there are balance mechanisms in place that at least give us a fighting chance when retaliation comes and we can be there to engage in it.

I think this could be a really great game, with some really great content given these changes.

Edited January 29, 2019 by Torch
Additional Content / Clarity

[LaiTash 156]

6 hours ago, Torch said:

If someone can put a ship in the water then they could make a "dock". The ship yard can function as a dock I suppose. You want to build another ship then you have to expand. If you are a solo player, how many ships should we expect someone to manage and have access to without risk anyway? If they don't have a base to put a ship in the water then the point is moot as they have yet to establish an entry point into the game. So what does it matter?

I'm not a solo player but now i'm sailing just tooooooo far away from our base so i think i count as one. You can build a dock in lawless, build a ship, and be on your way to never return. My ship is like 7 servers away from where it was built currently, and i don't have any plans of going back there. Because it was sold to me not just a game with territory control, but also as a game about long voyages and exploration and i'm trying to do just that. However right now it's only possible for me because i can log in from my workplace and don't mind having only 7 hours of sleep - this way i can outrepair the freeport decay. I could probably use your "docks" idea and just build a new dock every time i go to sleep, but lawless islands are cluttered with them already and it's only getting worse. 

Now i think most solo/duo players will begin to prefer nomadic gameplay too in the end. It's almost inevitable and it's good for the game (just think about the performance increase at lawless). So your idea won't work for them.

[Torch 16]

Ok. Fair enough. Thanks for the reply. Maybe there is a temporary anchor option, so if you are on a voyage, maybe more than 2 regions away from your designated home, and need to log off you can anchor for a short period of time with impunity. Beyond that time and you can get your teeth kicked in.