TheSzerdi

E11 has plentiful resources of all types necessary to build a schooner with cannons. It's a lawless spawn zone, but you can build a raft with a bed to respawn on. Expect to take all day farming and crafting with a group of four or five. Edit to add: Enjoy the eel pit.

My suggestion for land claims.

This one?

I've had an idea about that.

I actually just had an idea about that: Here

Game mechanics can set tax limit at say 20% and it's automatically taken while harvesting and put in the alliance leader tax chest. You'll have to hit a harvest node a couple extra swings for each resource you gather is all.

Before you freak out, read the whole idea. First, make all claim flags require a resource upkeep. Second, make that upkeep exponential based on the number of claim flags a company holds. (First flag is 50 wood and 50 fiber per week. By the fifth flag ALL flags require 200 wood, 200 fiber, 200 stone, and 200 berries from the biome type it is planted in per week. By the twentieth flag ALL flags require 1000 wood, 1000 fiber, 1000 stone, 300 metal, 500 berries of biome type, and 200 berries of each of the OTHER biome types per week. Change the flag models to increasingly extravagant structures as higher tier is reached. Maybe every five flags. Exact numbers will be need to be balanced.) Third, make all structures and anchored ships within the claim zone invulnerable so long as upkeep is being met. If upkeep is not met, fast decay times like lawless zones set in. (A pick lock feature to allow some raiding perhaps? Make characters unable to pick locks within 5 meters of a sleeping character?) Fourth, an opposing group's counter claim is a destroyable structure that will continue claiming regardless of ANY nearby players until it is destroyed. Make it require resources to build and make the claim timer much longer. Ships and structures lose invulnerability when the owner clan damages the counter claim structure. (This will need balancing to find best values. Like 500 wood, 500 stone, 200 hides, 120 cooked meat, and a four hour timer. It's a siege after all.) Please respond with refinements that would help balance or avoid exploits. I can't think of everything. Perhaps restricting counter claims to particular days of the week? Like odd numbered grid squares Thursdays and Saturdays, even numbers on Fridays and Sundays, Mondays through Wednesdays only areas that have failed upkeep can be counter claimed. I would prefer counter claims anywhere, anytime, but tiny groups might not agree.

There's still going to be a mega fortress on each island operated by the same people. There's still going to be the same number of people. It would make ships slightly easier to fight, but not much unless you drop clan size to like ten. It's an open world pvp game. The mega clans will rule no matter what. We're better off coming up with mechanics that offer them incentive to ally with small groups. Ideas like: Alliance leader setting taxes on allies. Claim flag settings to set specific flags as shared to specific allies. Building and storage settings to share with specific allies. Ship settings to share with specific allies and specific ranks. All of these allow mega clans to absorb small clans without the small clans losing their identities.

Each sub company takes an island. Every other sub company has one claim on the island with only a barracks full of beds in the claim. Edit to add: They should already be doing something like this. It prevents spies from destroying or stealing too much in one go.

I think you're underestimating the difficulty. Even without alliances a mega clan won't be slowed down at all. You could remove the clan system entirely and it wouldn't really matter. They have their own infrastructure. Their own communications. They don't need game mechanics to be a mega clan. We need game mechanics that appeal to the mega clans to ally with us.

What are you talking about? You want to stop mega clans. You can't. RainbowMurderHordeClan RainbowMurderHordeClan2 RainbowMurderHordeClan3 RainbowMurderHordeClan4 All using the same TeamSpeak or discord or whatever. I think it's better to give them more management tools like alliance taxes so they have a reason to work with smaller groups rather than just kill them. If you want to talk about game factions created by devs for regional quest goals, that's a whole different thread. It has nothing to do with mega clans.

Then what's the point?

You have no imagination. Rafts surrounding a ship holding it hostage for ransom. Just the first thing that came to mind.

You want the Chinese swarm to be able to join your hard coded faction and grief you? Think about it for a minute. Ships and bases you can't damage and can't throw out of your company.

You can't stop mega clans. They'll just split into smaller clans with a number on the end of their name. EVE has high sec, low sec, and null sec and character progress is not limited by safe areas. Join a big group / alliance or go to a private server. The devs should make alliance more appealing. Maybe allow the alliance leader to set and collect the taxes for all alliance land. Give an incentive to mega clans to accept alliance instead of just killing everyone.

A simple hard maximum number per server would be great.

My crew and I successfully navigated the maiden voyage of our schooner, the QFS Billy Mays. We'd sunk three ghost ships on the way and sorely needed a rest. We took on water and supplies in a Freeport. Short only on metal stock, we set sail once more. Before we'd even cleared the harbor one of the crew spotted something. A bottle floating near the shore. It held a treasure map! The island on the map wasn't too far, so we came about to port and set our sails to the wind. The treasure island was surrounded by ghost ships, but with some skilful navigation and the poor sailing of a doomed sloop, we made landfall. Locals quickly contacted us. We claimed to stop merely for supplies before moving on. They seemed friendly enough and did not appear to question our stated purpose. Two of my crew went ashore with the dinghy while I stayed aboard to keep an eye on the shiftless golems manning our sails. Lucky it was that I did. The “friendly” locals suddenly swarmed over the aft rail in a treacherous attempt to seize our ship. I barely managed to whip the shiftless golems into raising anchor and get the sails half up before being forced from the wheel. I fired all four of my pistols to no avail. Down to my pike, I managed a fighting retreat into the crew quarters. There I reloaded while muttering spells to summon my crew. With my crew aiding me by providing distraction I was able to sally forth. Pistols reloaded I fired upon the enemy and slowly reduced their number. Back to the cabin to reload, then sally forth again. The last boarder was a giant of a man in full plate armor wielding a gigantic mace. He absorbed two of my pistol balls as the bites of a mosquito. My last pistol boomed, but I'd missed and I drew my pike as he bore down. I danced away from a swing that would make a bear proud and just as quickly darted back in stabbing. The pistol wounds must have been more telling than they appeared, for he fell dead at my feet. The ship was ours! To die with! The damned were on us! Flaming green cannon balls fell like rain as the leviathan bone ships gave chase. I took the wheel as my crew manned the aft chase cannons. We ran and fought, but the damned would not relent. First one, then another, fell beneath our guns. Still they came on. Our beleaguered ship was holed in too many places. Our metal shortage now keenly felt. We bailed and boomed. We cursed and ran. But the Billy Mays was sunk and her crew lost at sea. Refusing to give in to the damned or despair I began swimming north. I swam and swam. Till my arms ached and I felt myself about to slip beneath the waves. Just as I thought I would die my hand slapped on wood. Saved by some flotsam! I was exhausted and parched. Damn whoever famously said it. Water, water, all around, but not a drop to drink. Carefully I sifted through the flotsam that I rested on. A few coins, bits of parchment, and AH-HA! A bottle of grog! Reinvigorated and with new hope I began to swim north again. As I crested each wave I could see a smudge upon the horizon. Slowly they rose, forming rocky hills, but still so terribly far. The small bottle of grog was wearing off in the worst way. I was dying for a drink. I'm not sure if the gods are in disagreement over my fate, but it certainly seems to waver between extremes. It rained. I swam slowly on my back and drank in the life giving sky water. Finally setting boot to sand feeling like one of the damned myself, I'd made it to land. My clothes in tatters, but my tools still strapped to my body, I would live. Near to starving and thoroughly exhausted I managed somehow to catch a chicken and cook it before passing out by my fire. Dawn brought new hope and new fears. I saw structures in the distance. The island was inhabited. Would these too present a friendly mask hiding wolves teeth? I skinned and gutted a few more creatures less wary than myself as I scouted around the island. I found an isolated house near some docked ships that had tool shops readily accessible around it. I couldn't resist the tannery and the chance to put my finery to rights. “Don't make any sudden moves and don't try to board the ship.” Caught red handed! I fell upon the mercy of the local and explained briefly how I came to his shores. He took me to his leader. To him I gave a full accounting of my tragic tale and he graciously gave me leave to craft what boat I could to go in search of my crew. With a truce in place and my finery restored I go now to build a raft and set off in search of my comrades.

Our schooner sunk six of them before the swarm finally dragged us down. We thought we'd escaped through the server wall, but there were two more waiting literally on top of us as we emerged. They are unending waves of horror and lamentation.

Animals aren't too bad. Respawn timer on them needs to be increased a bit. The ghost ships are insane though. Packs of four to six of them. Ringing every island. Insanity.

Can confirm, trapped in eel pit.