No ship, wood structure, or cannon blueprints

[mgsgta3 13]

Hear me out. 

After playing through 7k hours in Ark, and seeing the journey that went on from start to finish, then playing this for many hours I have come to the conclusion that blueprints for ships and anything that goes on a ship detracts from Atlas' potential. Sure the resource hunt is good because it forces us to explore, so by all means they should keep it for armor, weapons, stone structures, etc.  For ships though, no. Heres why:
Say a skilled solo player is sailing around on his decked out brig and comes across a brig from a big company, and its manned by one player as well(and npcs on all cannons,sails). So it's an even fight on that basis. The rest, like cannon placement, choice of sails are different. Big company guy has his cannons hanging off the edge of his ship and ready to be pounded by cannons. He has a poor configuration of sails, poor ammo choice for his swivels, etc. Meanwhile the skilled player has his sails right, cannons set right, swivels loaded right.The battle begins, and skilled guy is maneuvering all over the place landing hits all day, but no planks break.  The other guy keeps missing, but he aint worried. Not a bit. Hell he could flat out stop and bathe in cannonball rain for 2-3 minutes if he wanted. He doesnt though, and instead eventually nails a shot on the skilled boat. That one hit blows through the skilled guys brig and takes out a few planks. Skilled guy keep slanding barrages of hits, then eventually sinks to his lost planks while not having broken any. 
Sound fun? Its not, for either side. Ive been on both sides, and the uneven ship battles are stupid. It should be entirely up to what stats you put in your boat, how you built it, and your skill as a driver and cannon shooter.
To replace tiered blueprints they should:
 1)expand upon the "armored hull" idea i heard they are adding for ships and just make a few types of planks
            1.1)some that are light and weak and more aerodynamic(would that be hydrodynamic in water?) so it could move faster,
             1.2)some that are heavier and reinforced,
             1.3) Some that are better for maneuvering and have normal speed and armor rating
2)expand upon attributes to level up on ships(similar to the damage level up they are supposedly adding). 
3)make sail placement matter in a more realistic manner, like how a sail being at the front or back would completely change the way in which a boat turns as it would in real life.
4)Add other propulsion methods, like some npc homies below deck rowing away on a predesignated "rowing deck" out of Rowports instead of on cannons and gunports, so you get signifigant speed over normal ships but wouldnt be able to place cannons below deck, the spinning wheel thing thats on NPC merchant ships,  etc. 

If we had this instead of blueprints I think the ship battles would be infinitely more fun, as theyd be more skill based, from how you built the ship, what you used to build it, and so on. 

[Willard 245]

I think they should adjust droprates but otherwise its fine. You could relate this to other BPs too. Skilled player with bad BPs of guns against PvE player with legendary armor. Skilled player can shoot him 10 times and PVE player won't die. Then he accidentaly hits and oneshots skilled player with poor gear. This could continue to other areas. 

I get what you are trying to say but what you propose would remove a lot of activity in game. There would be no point of farming NPC ships for BPs because it would't help you anyhow. No point for farming other materials or gold for buying that material.

I know its hard for solo players to farm BPs, farm treasures for gold to get different type of materials from freeport NPCs, but you can always join some 5-people group and do it together or just do it during double weekends. This game is harsh to solo players, I know that. At least now it won't be so easy to lose ships against offline griefers.

While I don't agree with that BPs removal those ideas of different type of planks, sail placement etc. are really good.

Edited April 1, 2019 by Willard

[IAmAnEasterEgg 25]

Skilled guy is better at farming the SOD to get better blueprints so should have a better boat too. Gold was easy to get so go to freeport get the materials needed or farm the materials to craft the better blue print.  The only think I'd change is that building everything should be available but the unlocks on the BP screen should allow you to build better items 

[znasser 81]

Your story is a load of crap and you know it. Maybe high grade mythic/legendary stuff could give you that kind of advantage, i doubt it but i don't know because i haven't face it because its ultrarare. The stuff people usually have is at best some masterwork things here and there, and i can tell you they can be sunk by a simple ship of the same kind. Anyway any skilled ship player would level up the ship before he gets into combat and guess what you get when you go to level up? The game is an MMO, or at least it intends to be so there's nothing wrong with having better gear as long it is balanced, and if it wasn't, all they have to do is change a few numbers.

[Kappinski 58]

you can reduce all the fancy parts of your story basically into a scenario where two guys have a melee fight and only one of them has a sword. Sounds fun? Nope!
But you cannot even out every difference in this game. This is not a MOBA or another Esport game. It doesn't have to be perfectly balanced because THAT wouldn't be fun either. Skill is not everything and that's a good thing. No need for a change.
If we would end up in even scenarios every time you could scrap ALL of the farming, crafting, exploring, leveling stuff. Because it would be pointless.

[mgsgta3 13]

Okay I will rephrase. What value does upgraded ship parts bring to the game? 

The more important part everyone skipped over as well is the suggestion of more unique ship parts

 

[Sneakydude 143]

57 minutes ago, mgsgta3 said:

Okay I will rephrase. What value does upgraded ship parts bring to the game? 

The more important part everyone skipped over as well is the suggestion of more unique ship parts

 

It allows the megas to get it first, and last... Everyone else struggles.