wildbill

Just built a schooner. I put everything on it that would fit easily. Loading an elephant, some supplies. It was about half the weight (this is a modded ship, so would be more for a regular). I went out and collected a few resources. Adding just 1k more weight noticeably slowed the ship. Ya, you really can't use a schooner as a base because it just slows down if you add anything more to it when you are out exploring. I love the schooner for treasure hunting though, since it can get into all the harbors and most shallow areas. The Brig can't do that. Also Atlas is not just an mmo. The official servers are what some would describe as an mmo, but not like most, but the game also has other modes you can play it in. I can play single player. If I want someone to join me on an adventure in my single player, I can launch it as non-dedicated. I personally only play the single player mode and think it is an important addition to the game. Until the game is out of Early Access, it is the only way I'll be playing. I'm waiting to see if the game becomes something I'd play on a server (my preferred way to play games). If it never meets my expectations, I'll never play anything but single player from now on. If Atlas is ever changed to be more like a typical mmo (player is not in game when you are offline, etc.), I'd play the mmo version. Right now, I don't consider Atlas to be an mmo, more like they found a clever way to extend a low population server game to have many more players, but in the process did not add any of the typical mmo features.

Are you playing on Blackwood single player? Every youtube video I've seen where they play single player it crashes. Happens every time to me. I've seen lots of posts about it too. You are the first to say it isn't crashing. Many people use the Blackwood map for single player play, because it is big enough to get the flavor of Atlas, but not the huge over 100 grid server that takes up so much time traveling all over those maps all by yourself. People also use it for non-dedicated, since you can do that when you don't have to travel across grid borders. I have not tried non-dedicate yet, possibly other maps would work with it, not sure, but Blackwood should be a good choice. I didn't mention single player, I just assumed if someone is playing Blackwood, they are playing single player.

I'm salty too. I stuck with the game for maybe six months. Got tired of my wife complaining about the boring sea trips just to kill a few army of the dead for treasure maps. She loves to kill stuff, but there just isn't enough killing in this game to keep her happy When I did play with my wife, she would play with me maybe 1/4 of the time. I would tame up some bears. Make a good schooner or brig, collect a bunch of treasure maps and we would go out killing and collecting the treasure. This was about a year ago. Back then, the game was half fun, half frustration. If she logged out on the ship, sometimes I'd run into problems with that. We lost tames when loading onto ships (this is now fixed thankfully). We would find treasure, but find we couldn't get to it with our bears. My wife hates dying, so we would skip those maps. Occasionally an alpha would kill us. Then a server would shut down when everyone got bored with the game (we played the unofficial so the grind was less). Just seemed like there were better games for her to just be killing stuff

I tried fishing at the freeport, got no bites. Instead I installed the rations mod. No worries now. I eventually found the small pond with fish in it on the freeport island. Also when visiting one of the snow islands, I dived in the water from my ship to go ashore and saw a few tuna. So other islands do have fish in the ocean.

I've only played Blackwood about 10 hours and haven't played Atlas on a server in over half a year. There are SoTD, but I've yet to see more than one in one area. Not the groups like other maps, and I think not that many. There are Treasure maps, you can look at them and try and guess which island they are for (there are I think 8 islands, so not too hard), but do not select them in your hotbar, this will crash the game. If you are playing single player, this will cause a rollback. I've had like 5 minute and just like 1 minute rollbacks so far. It is very easy to accidentally hit a hotbar key even when you know this will crash the game. Takes some practice to not do that, so this one bug sucks pretty big. I did manage to find a lot of treasure though, so not too big of a deal breaker. I have not seen much sea life, but I tend not to go in the sea. The freeport island only had fish in a few ponds. I use a mod for food, so the difficulty in finding fish is not a big deal for me. Shouldn't be for you, you are bound to get eaten by a tiger at first, this will balance your vitamins You didn't ask about sunken ships. It has those, although I've never done one. Maybe I will try it when I have a submarine or Brig. Right now I have just the schooner.

I think that could be a fine addition to the game. They made banks where you could place them near a resource and it would tax all that gathered the resources within the claim at that location. Instead of requiring others to harvest the resource and then taking part of their hard work, this could be adapted to have a new building with a few NPCs that harvest selected nearby resources and then ship them back to a home port (the automated shipping part). On the return trip, the home base would send food and gold for the NPCs to pay them for their work. This could be a "Trade Post". This new way of getting resource would essentially remove the need for fast travel. You find the resource in your travels, then set up a trade post to gather them for you. You place a few NPCs there and then continue exploring to find more locations or head back to the home port. Other players could place trade posts in the same area. Each trade post would have a small no build area, limiting the total number of trade posts that could be placed. I like the idea of trade routes too. A player could set these up from either their home port or the locations of their trade posts to exchange resource or gold with other players. I assume this idea has been beaten to death, although I haven't read any of those posts. An addition like this could work for single player too, you just wouldn't trade with other players. Possibly NPCs could be added that you trade with.

I'd like to see a game like you describe, although Atlas is a long ways from being that game. If they just removed 90% of the tames and 80% of the land and made no other changes, the game would be the mess we saw in the first few weeks of the game. Players plopped down claim flags on every claimable bit of land. You could sail for hours and never find a spot where you could place a flag.This is because when something is scarce, people horde it. It will not be a pretty site, not fun for you average player. I had hoped the game would allow you to live on your ship and stay at sea for long periods. That game is not even close to what Atlas is. It would take years to transform the game into that, which I suppose is the reason they did not go that route. Instead they took what they had from ARK (and I think a ship mod) and made the best game they could. It seems obvious now, but I did expect more. Now that they have picked this course of combing ARK with ships, fantasy stuff, and pirate aspects, they should probably stay on course and just keep improving it. It will never be what many were hoping for, but could eventually be a very good game.

I keep seeing this idea proposed of having a server with both PvP and PvE. I assume you are suggesting they add a new type of official server with this. Although I fail to see how PvP and PvE on one server isn't just a PvP server. All PvP players engage in PvE activities. When they make alliances and establish a safe area, maybe a whole island or grid of the server, they are essentially just playing PvE only in that area. So what game has no separate PvE and PvP servers? Never seen this. Does it actually work? If it is such a good idea, where are the great examples of it? Personally I only play PvP on games where you don't lose your ship/base (your main location where you log in / log off). I think if Atlas ever switched to only having this "combined" (PvP only) mode, they would lose over half the player base instantly (almost all of the PvE players). So what would be the point? PvE players aren't fodder for the PvP players if that is what you are thinking. They aren't slaves to them either. They aren't added content to keep the PvP players interested. I've seen games with just PvP, but they are not sandbox style games. You don't play them for months collecting tames and building a huge base. One I played quite a long time ago was I think called Battlestar Gallactica. You would never lose your ship if you lost a battle, you just got moved back to the starting location. You never really lost anything, but you could gain stuff if you won. ARK is nothing like that and a PvE player would never want to play it in PvP mode. Some of your ideas make sense for a PvP server. You might get more people to play PvP mode if the game had factions. Those players that play PvP in most games, but not Atlas might play.

I wonder how many people use icebox? Maybe just people who have a base in the north. I have never used it, I use the preserving bag.

I took a break from Atlas shortly after posting in this thread on Feb 4. I've come back to play a bit of Atlas and I'm a bit surprised that 10 months later this has not been addressed. In the week I've been playing, I've seen some other nice additions (single player is one of them) and other bugs have been addressed (some like this have not). I expected maybe a bit more would have been done in 10 months.

You don't say what platform or where you play, but there are mods that can be used in single player, non-dedicated, and unofficial servers. Several different mods add new ship types. I've yet to try any of these, but just reading about them, some look interesting.

Doesn't really matter who said it, but here is the first sentence from the paragraph on the Steam page that describes the game: "From the creators of ARK: Survival Evolved comes ATLAS -- the ultimate pirate experience!" It ends that paragraph with: "Become a pirate legend in this ultimate quest for fortune and glory!" So the makers of Atlas say it is a pirate game. You kind of prove the point I was making, that Atlas is supposed to be a Pirate game, but it has yet to deliver fully on that promise (still in early access of course). I think the intent is that the players in the game are pirates, but also the SOD. When hire crew from shore or a SOD, you are hiring pirates.The hide outfits you learn also make the player look like a pirate. You can give your player a tattoo, which is a pirate thing. Now they have added pirate encampments. I've yet to see one, but apparently they are pretty buggy still. As someone else pointed out, pirates don't normally fight other pirates, they fight other countries armies mostly. From the trailer release when the game was first released, it appeared like that would be a thing, but instead we have pirates (us) fighting pirates (NPCs) in PvE, and in PvP you can fight other players (pirates too). That is a whole different discussion. This topic is about fast travel. On that topic, I wish that the ship travel would have been more like how you use a quetzal in ARK. When you are traveling somewhere to get resources in ARK with your quetzal, you travel above the danger in relative safety. You can go down to the ground and engage various threats when you want. Also when you land you deal with creatures on the ground. Travel is quick (less than 15 minutes). You can land pretty much within a minute at relatively safe locations pretty much anytime you desire. In PvE, your quetzal dominates the skies (at least for the Island map). That is what I would have liked sailing to be like. I know that most people don't agree, but possibly most of the PvE crowd might prefer this.

Ya, the game has nothing to do what a real pirate to do, I only said that because boomer brought up it up. But still, you can't avoid some comparison when the game has pirates in it, but that is not of course all the game is about. It also has sailing ships too, but that doesn't mean the ships should actually act like the real thing. When I went sailing on my boat it would take me eight hours or more to get where I was going. Nobody wants that here either (I hope). Yes, I do like the sailing too, just not how long it takes. I like to play games with my wife. She will not play Atlas at all with me after she tried it for a bit. She spends half her time on the ship just watching for SOD and then me steering around them most of the time. Extremely boring for her. She likes to kill stuff. The game could use more of that and less of sailing. My actual biggest gripe with the sailing is that you can not pause the game or log off while you are sailing if suddenly something in real life comes up (and it does). I'm now playing single player only, since I think I'll be able to log off on the ship, although I've yet to try that. I would like to play on servers, but with the current state of the game, that won't really be an option for me.

You kind of removed all of what I said that supported my point and only left the part that supported your point. Yes, a pirate game would have sailing, anyone that would think it doesn't is not too bright, but that wasn't my point at all. This game has sailing (and yes, many don't enjoy the sailing) required before you can do many activities, but it is just a means of travel most of the time, not really an activity that many would chose to do for it own sake, hence the game is not a sailing game, it is a pirate game. The reason for the distinction? Removing some of the sailing would not damage the game, because it is a pirate game, not a sailing game. Removing the pirates from a pirate game, unquestionably a bad choice. Removing the requirement to sail to do just about any activity (like find treasure or go kill that monster) from a pirate game, not that big a deal. So why the big objection to maybe adding a portal or some other device that lets you get to where you need to go faster? And maybe we need to make the distinction between PvE and PvP. For PvE I think it would do nothing but improve the game. Don't care, don't know about PvP. If there were less sailing, there would be more pirate like activities, that is my point. Not that a pirate game should not have sailing. The other point I made that you removed, is that if the game is based around sailing, and it is. Why the heck isn't having a base on a boat a reasonable thing to do? I explained that in my other post, why not. But that really should be a thing in this game, and that it is not, makes it not even that much of a pirate game as it should be. Who ever heard of pirates that didn't live on their boat? So yes, there are two ways to fix this game. The "Altas is a sailing game" crowd say make the sailing the more enjoyable. But some of us that think this is a pirate game think maybe just have less sailing. Because I think both camps pretty much agree, the sailing part of this game sucks after you've sailed about 100 hours.

This skill system is a bit confusing for someone coming from ARK. This page describes the skills: https://atlas.gamepedia.com/Skills Things are color coded with a colored thin lined box around each skill. If the box is green, you have that skill. If there is no colored box around the skill, you have not learned the prerequisite for that skill. If you start with the left most tab for skill (I think it is called survival), you can start at the top and then each time you learn a skill pay attention as to whether it unlocks a new tab. If it does, then when you select that tab, the top item should now have a colored box around it (I think it is orange). You learn that skill and the box goes green and it unlocks skills below it that you can learn. So I think what you were doing was trying to learn skills that are locked behind prerequisite skills.

BTW, talking about terrible programming. I stopped playing Atlas over six months ago, but I'm considering playing a bit of single player or non-dedicated. The one bug I recall that was very annoying was using the menu to load a tame onto a boat and it would just disappear and then you get a message a few seconds later that it died (apparently it was teleported up above the map). Has that bug been fixed?

Ah, never thought of it that way. This explains why taming using a tame that has a lot of hit points works. You get the agro onto your tame and then when you feed it, it doesn't attack you. (At least I assume it works that way, I've never tried to do it that way.)

I'm just starting on the map at the freeport. Don't have the sugar cane or shovel yet to get the earthworms to go fishing. So far hasn't been a problem because for some reason, tigers are spawning at the freeport and killing me, rebalancing my vitamins for me

I watched a video from FireSpark81 on the Blackwood map. He made four videos and when this started happening, no more videos after that. The bug wouldn't be so bad, but your also going to get a rollback of your game in single player unlike if you were on a server.

I think you left out just having the game play for you The game doesn't just require travel for rewards, it requires travel for just about everything. You want some metal, but none on the island you are on? Travel from 15 minutes to an hour to get it and then you travel back. If the game actually met some of the expectations of people that played it, that would be different. I played the game the very first day it came out. I expected to be able to play as a pirate on a ship and not need a base. But the game is still about land claims and base building. Over half of the game has nothing to do with being on a ship. If you are foolish enough to make a base on a ship, you risk losing everything you own in just a few minutes should you walk away to go to the bathroom at the wrong moment. I know the game is still early access, and yes, I got tired of waiting. ARK in early access at least met the expectations of players. It was a game with dinosaurs and it delivered on that right from the start. Atlas should be a pirate game but I just played as a new character this morning and got killed three times by tigers. Not sure what that has to do with being a pirate.

Right. Personally I don't want any of those things. I play single player and also plan to play non-dedicated with my wife. None of those are important for that type of play. When I do play on a server, I seldom interact with other players other than to admire their base. I do interact with people I've known for months, people I normally play with, but that is a small percentage of the players on a server and not enough for an economy or trading to exist. I'd quess at least 50% of the other players I've been on a server with play in a similar fashion. I really think the main problem with Atlas player numbers, is they have designed the game to a very limited audience. That is fine, although it is not going to attract someone like me for long. I played a bit and tried my best to make the game work for me, but it just doesn't in so many ways (not just fast travel, but that is a big one).

Hmm, more people play Conan Exiles than Atlas, so fast travel hasn't been that bad for it. Also you don't say it, but you are only talking about PvP. Most people playing Conan are playing PvE and fast travel does not wreck anything in PvE. The key to making fast travel work, is that just like in Conan, you must visit the location the normal way the first time. After that, you get to use fast travel. For all those that think it would wreck PvP, it could be disabled for PvP.

With the way this works, I have never actually tamed an elephant. Was waiting for this to be fixed. Looks like I may never tame one ever.

You do know that the majority of players that play Conan play it as PvE, not as PvP, and yes, many use fast travel. Fast travel does not ruin PvE, it actually helps it, because traveling to other players bases is half the fun of playing on a server.

Many an ARK player only plays single player with a teleport mod installed or on a server with a teleport mod. I'm one of those players. Problem with Atlas is that they designed it around multiple maps with no way to travel from one map to another except while on a ship (as far as I know). I searched and I don't see a single teleport mod because of the way it is designed. This is true even for single player. From what I've read, each grid (map) isn't loaded until the player hits the boundary and then it loads into the new grid. Since it isn't running until you sail to it, there is nothing to teleport to, so apparently teleporting mods can not exist. Atlas could have a much bigger audience of players if they would have supported this one feature either in game or in a mod (possibly the devs would have to write this one).