Captain Jack Shadow

Agreed. It's fine to address things that you think are a problem, and offer suggested solutions, if you can. But just bad mouthing the game...no...not cool.

The reality is simply this...some people like to play in really large companies, and some do not. People need to be honest about which they really want, and go with that. At the same time, the Devs need to provide servers for both. Many people did not come back, that were going to come back, because the word got out that the megas were going to Colonies, which did happen. Companies of 50 people, are not small companies. Most people run in groups of about a dozen people. This should have been the target...maybe making it such that you could be in a company up to 24 people, or two or more companies, with the total alliance membership not exceeding 24. Anyone caught acting in a manner of a large company, would be in violation of the TOS...exploiting weaknesses in the game code. The rule should be simple...large companies are not allowed...do not do it outside of the game's mechanics. Violators will be wiped. Trading would be encouraged, but the system should incorporate minimum and maximum prices for things. But, a better idea would be to just go to factions. You still have companies, but you are aligned with a faction. Like being part of a nation. Instead of owning islands, you are given a small area to build in. A land claim, like the old ones, but about the size of the Sea Claim. And a second one that has to be placed along a shore, and covering a fair bit of water...for a port. You could place a new one, to move, but that would start a 48 hour timer for decay, on your old structures. Maybe a little longer. Maybe up to a week. What this would do is help incorporate small companies, and solos, into a larger network, where they are more protected, and can participate in many different activities, along with the faction.

I agree that the system needs work. However, animals in captivity, in real life, don't always breed just because a mate is present. The Panda is famous for this. Stress can also cause them to not want to breed. So, a couple of changes to make it more interactive, and realistic would be: Create a cool down timer for an animal that has been brought to an island that is not it's normal biome type. The more drastic the change, the longer the cool down. So something like Equatorial, to Polar, would be the longest timer. Make females refuse to mate with a male, if their is a more Alpha male nearby. Thus, you have to remove higher level males, when you are trying to capture a good stat from a really low level male. Males would mate with any female that is present. There could also be some sort of cool down to this, with it being longer before the female will mate with this particular male, if he is significantly lower in level than she is.

You guys must be doing a lot of fighting, or had a bunch of ships sunk in your harbor. They do disappear after a while, but it's good that they stick around for a while. if you see a lot of your company's ships sunk in an area of the map, you know that is a high risk area. I do, however, think there should be an option to either remove them from your map, or just turn them off, so that you can see what's under the wreck icon. Same for beds. I placed a marker on the map, but could not see exactly where it was, because the area was covered in beds. I would like a toggle for those. Certainly you don't want them to be gone, when you need to respawn, but when you are just exploring the Atlas map by hitting i, and then Atlas, it would be nice to be able to toggle them off, to see what's under them. Same for ships.

Thanks.

He is. But not everyone will know that. Don't assume everyone knows the acronym for a game, movie, books, or TV show. Believe it or not, there were many people who did not watch GoT. Right? And I was caught using the acronym, in the first mention to them, like I just did. Like, "You going to watch GoT tonight?" And I get this in response, "GoT?"

BDO? Big Duck Online? Speak English. Learn when to use initials, and acronyms, and when not to. Using BDO in the OP is not the way to start a thread. Many people are not going to know what game you are talking about. This is also common practice when writing any kind of formal paper. The first time you mention someone, or something, you use a full name first. For instance, and article where a professor is interviewed, it would go something like this. "We reached out to Professor John, A Smith, Professor of Descriptive Writing at the University of Atlas, for his thoughts on how to write an opening post." Then, after this introduction, they will typically use the title and last name, such as Professor Smith. Sometimes, they may just say, Smith, but some feel that is bad form, when the person has a respected title. But the point is clear...you make sure people are aware of what you are talking about. You don't assume they know who "Professor Smith," is, or what his expertise is. I see this all too often in gaming forums, or comment sections, where gamers like to throw around the acronyms to appear to be in the know...to appear to belong. Problem is, there are hundreds...thousands of games, books, movies, gangs, clubs, etc., where people will use acronyms. Not everyone looks into all things gaming related. I used to, but anymore, I just pay attention to the games I am playing, and talk to people I know. I don't read much gaming news anymore. Can't be bothered. Too busy. Also, when using an acronym, you introduce both in the first mention. Like this.... Black Desert Online (BDO), decides to take your idea and shows you... Now everyone is on the same page, whether or not they know anything about BDO

Right, and I see that, but my idea is a bit different in that it allows people to protect there stuff in a way that allows people who aren't being stupid, to never get wiped into oblivion, but...but, it does require them to put those assets at risk, on a regular basis...just not everything at one time. So, they might get a ship sunk, or a bank raided, and lose some stuff, but the majority of stuff would be protected in a central bank, on Freeports. Your breeders would be in a similar bank...a sort of stables area where you go to pull the animal out...just like you would pull them out of a obelisk on ARK...but this would not have a timer that automatically deletes your tame. Instead, you pay rent to keep it there. If you fall behind, you simply can't pull it out, until you pay what is owed. Taking things to the banks, and pulling them out to use them, would put them at risk. Like, you have a BP that you want to protect. Pulling it out puts a decay timer on it. So you want to pull it out, and take it home to use it, and if there are still plenty of crafts left on it, you want to get it back into the bank, so that creates opportunities for people to capture it. The decay timer starts the second you obtain the BP. When you put it into the bank, the timer is reset...not stopped...reset. What would be better is a timer that counts down when it is not in the bank, but when in the bank, it counts back up...which would prevent people from just using the bank to reset the timer. Or just have it such that it has to be in the bank for a set number of days to reset the timer. Same for maps. Gold would accrue interest in the bank. So you have incentives to keep these things there, along with their being safer from being wiped. It might also help with anti-cheat protection. The breeders could be handles just like the gold, maps, and BPs, in that you pull them out and take them home to breed them, which puts them at risk, or allow for us to breed them right there on the island, and transport the babies home. I could see a possible breeding facility being made...a specific size for each pair you will breed, and it has everything included that you need for the process. Trough, heating, and cooling methods. You take it to some spot on the island...specific spots that don't block spawns...maybe even having to rent the spot...and you set up the breeding stable, which will decay shortly after the breeding process, and gestation, and 10% of maturation, is complete. The reason I think breeders should be more protected is because of the sheer amount of time and effort it takes to get a very high level tame. It can take many months. How many people do you think will keep playing, when a pair of bears, that took 6 months, to a year to get, are killed in a wipe? This is an imbalance in these types of games. If something takes a really long time to acquire, you don't want it to be lost...or at least not at all easy to lose. An FPS game is usually pretty well balanced in this regard...you spawn, run, shoot, kill, run, die, respawn, and repeat the process. Death comes easy, but recovery isn't very difficult. You either don't lose your stuff, or you can get equally good stuff pretty quickly. Breeders can take a really long time, and a whole lot of effort to get. So, I do think that stables that you rent...and no, not some absurd thing like 1,000 gold per day per bear...is a good thing. But, you don't want thousands of bears on the freeport, or elephants, tigers, etc...so you turn them over to the stable owner, which is really just uploading them, like uploading to on obelisk.

Not sure what you mean? I'm simply asking for cannons that have the same long range as a heavy cannon, on a ship, so that somebody can't creep up on a port...find the range where they can hit from, but the enemy defenses cannot. This allows them to just sit there, with no danger, taking down your defenses. That is what I am looking to fix. Not sure what cliffs, or lack of cliffs have to do with it.

That was the point. I was stating that this cannon should NOT be outranged by cannon bears or ship cannons, which would prevent the enemy from finding sweet spots from which they can fire at the defenses, without being fired at. In otherwords, I am saying that I want there to be no range differences.

Was my post, at all helpful to you? You have to be very diligent about identifying the mutations, and NOT using bad mutations for breeding. Somebody can correct me if I am wrong, but AFAIK, a mutation doesn't have to be passed along, to still have the mutations saying, for instance, 1/20. In other words, let's say your male bear had a mutated Melee stat, and that is higher than the female. But the baby comes out with the mom's melee state...when you check the baby's mutations, it still says, 1/20, just like the dad. That count is really just keeping count of the mutations that occurred in the breeding line, on both the paternal, and maternal sides. Trust me on this...the most tenacious breeders toss away a lot of babies...good babies...to get what they want. But, you also have to throw away a lot of bad babies...a lot of bad babies. Keeping track of those mutations is a must. One slip up can ruin your whole breeding line, especially if you are not retaining all of the parents. Without those parents, you can't backtrack to get rid of an unwanted mutation. Now, I don't know yet, if Atlas is allowing what we did in ARK, but in ARK, this is what we did. Breed for just Melee mutations only. You keep breeding for just Melee mutations until both the maternal and paternal mutations are maxxed out. Then you set some babies aside with that max melee, and start doing the same with "clean" parents...no mutations...and look for health mutations. Repeat the same process. Breed the max melee babies with the max health babies. Look for babies that catch both stats. There may be a limit to this on Atlas, and in fact, I am sure there is. But this just makes it even more important not to waste mutations on useless stats. 1. Melee and Health. 2. Stamina and Weight. All others are basically useless. If you cannot see the mutation, it is not a keeper. Make that baby a company bear, for general use. Also, all mutations include both a color, and a stat mutation. Also, while rare, a negative mutation can occur...so again, the dad can have a 9 melee, and the mom a 7, and the baby get a 7 melee, which is the dad's melee, mutated negatively to be the same as the mothers. But again, don't let this be complicated...if you can't see a good mutation...stop worrying about it...you didn't get a good mutation. It's NOT a breeder. In other words, if you were looking for a Health or Melee mutation, and it says the dad gave the mutation, but you don't see a health or melee stat better than the dad's...you didn't get what you were looking for. Don't breed that baby.

Not really. It can take months to build up a breeding line to a good level, yet somebody who wipes your base can, and likely will, take all of that away from you in one day. How many people will start all over? A lot won't. Bases are where you store all of your BPs, and Maps, so that is again, another problem. It takes a lot of time to get to where you have a solid amount of good BPs, so again, after a wipe, you are starting over. Now, I suppose if your idea is used, people would just keep everything on ships, and transfer to other ships, when not being used...OR, they would actually create ships to act as vaults, and animal storage. I think the goal should be to allow people to protect ALL of their stuff, but also create reasons where they will need to expose small amounts of the valuable stuff, repeatedly. This way, in boxing terms, you get punched in the jaw, and it hurts when that happens, but you never get knocked out. Worst case would be that you get knocked down when you get caught being stupid, but again, you don't get knocked out. This should be the goal. This, IMHO, would help keep people from having their morale knocked into the dirt. They remain excited about the game. They have a reason to keep working, to overcome those punches to the jaw...but they never have to experience that hopeless feeling, many get when they are wiped.

My ideas center on the idea that being totally wiped, is a morale breaker for many gamers, who then quit, and never return to the game.

NOTE: Folders must be created immediately after taming a wild, or claiming a baby. Imprinting a baby...hugging or taking for a walk...adds to the value of the stats, hiding who the parent is for each stat. Same for adding levels to an animal. The folders must be created when you see the raw stats. Or you will need to have those values written down, or in a screenshot. Folders in the inventory, are the best option. For the Squid above, one folder would say, Stamina 510. Another would say Health 6400. Etc...

Without a scope mod, on an unofficial server, you may not be able to tell where the mutation occurred. Even then, you have to be very diligent about spotting the mutation. This is what you MUST do, if you want to be a breeder. Make sure that any animal that is tamed, has folders created in its inventory. One for each stat, including torpor. You do this immediately after taming. Make sure all babies have folders created for each stat. This must be done between claiming the baby, and it's first imprinting. Screenshots can also be used, but risky, as that file can be deleted, or lost, or you forget to label the file, or somebody changes the name of the animal, and now you don't know which file belongs to that animal. Folders in the animal are there forever, unless deleted, or the animal dies, in which case they are no longer needed. When a baby is born, and you have created those folders, you next step is to check ancestry, to look for mutations. This tells you which side the mutation came from. You now only have to compare the baby's stats to the parent's stat, that gave the baby a mutated stat. If you do not see a stat that is mutated, look closer. For instance, the mother may have had a 7 Melee, while the dad had a 9. The baby has a 9, so you assume that the stat is from the dad...no, it is from the mom, and and the 7 mutated to a 9. I used those numbers, because that is what you see with something like the "awesome spyscope." The point is that those numbers point to a specific stat that is always the same from animal to animal. Like 150% Melee, for instance. So let's use that number, and this is why the folders are important. Let's say you breed bears, and are now using two of those to breed with. You imprinted them, and have added levels, so now you do not know what the "RAW STAT" is. The Raw Stat is that 150% Melee, that you saw, right after claiming the baby, and before you did any imprinting. Note, that when I say claiming...that can be confused with imprinting. Claiming is when the baby has popped out of the mom, and has a red tag, and it is telling you to press E to imprint it. You are claiming the baby when you do this. This is when you want to create those folders. These are the stats that will be passed on to a baby. In the stats you cannot see, each stat will have a number. Those numbers, plus one, will add up to the level of the baby when born, or an animal that you tame, after it has been tamed. You see that as its "wild levels." Those numbers are random. You can have a bear with anything from a 0, to something much higher. Extremely high numbers are rare. The number could never be higher than the wild levels minus 1. For instance, if you tamed a bear and it tames out to a level 5, the highest stat any stat could have, is a 4. It is more likely that you would have 4 stats with a 1. The rest would be 0. I have not done the work to figure out what all the possible stats are, when an animal is tamed. If I had, I could tell what number each stat translates to. To give you an idea, here is a low level Squid from Ark. It is a good example, because it has very similar numbers to what a level 30 would tame out to. If you notice, the numbers add up to 44, which is one short of the level of the squid. Those are the numbers I was referring to. So now, with these squids, and squid with a 9 health, is going to have 6.4k health. But this is a squid from Crystal Isles, that can't be tamed. TL,DR So let's assume this squid is tamable, and a good level. You have two tamed squids. This one...the dad... has the higher stats for Health(6.4K), Food(5.8K), and Stamina(510). The mutation says it came from the dad. So you want one of those stats, mutated to a higher level. Is the light coming on? It's quite easy. If you do not see one of those stats with an increased value, it is not going to be a breeder. It did not get a good mutation.

Discuss.

I agree. Some may assume that the people who left, just don't like PvP. I disagree, wholeheartedly. The reason is that when you are wiped, you now have to rebuild everything, and get all new BPs, and gold, and breeding animals, etc.. You have to rebuild a new base, and new ships, etc... You now know that you cannot PvP...you must PvE, to get built back up. This can take many weeks, or months, and you always lose people after a wipe, so you know it will be harder to get back to where you were, and there is no guarantee that you will get back to where you were. You are now at a disadvantage...you are now a "Have Not," and so the enemies have a huge advantage against you. I truly do believe that the reason why people leave, and don't come back can be boiled down to one single word. Morale I don't think Atlas is the only one to suffer this. I think most games like this, have suffered for the same reason, but of all the games I have played like this, Atlas presents the most daunting prospect for rebuilding. And, it isn't just the offline raiding. It's also the online raiding. You not only play "wack-a-mole," but you play, "where-is-the-mole?" So, your suggestion is one I have been thinking about...the need for something that tells you the general vicinity of the enemy. Not pin point, but the general vicinity. I do not have all the answers for this, because I do not know what the Devs can, or would do to fix this. I don't know how far they are willing to go. But, my opinion is that you have to find a way to give people a reason...a real reason, to fight, without that fight costing people everything. That is the problem now. Getting wiped costs you everything. Getting raided costs you nearly everything, because people kill your tames, to see if you are hiding anything good in them, and just to hurt you...and they sink everything they can, and they popcorn every last item they don't want. Not to mention that if they destroyed the container, every last item that was in it, will disappear in 30 minutes. IMHO, that is an easy fix they can do right away. First, make it so the containers can be unlocked with enough damage to the container/crafting station. So now you can get into it without destroying it. Second, find a way to end popcorning. I am not sure how you would do this. It would take a lot of thought, to make sure the fix doesn't become an exploit. Personally, I think they should start up a PvP server where there is NO land wiping, but make it such that you really do have to get out to sea more. So, this is what I would do. Make a central bank at the Freeport. Here, you can store maps, BPs, Gold, and rare resources. Items in the bank cannot be taken from you. While wiping is not possible, raiding is possible. Walls are indestructible. The company bank is now where things are kept, when not on your person, in a ship, or All resources, all maps, all BPs, all gold. The company bank cannot be enclosed within a structure. It has to be semi-vulnerable. The bank is visible to everything on the island. Crew draw gold, crafting stations see BPs, etc.. Make a mechanic that makes things go to this bank when you get near the island, and when you pull them out, a decay timer starts. Or just have the decay timer. The only place these things don't decay, are in the company bank, or the central bank. The company bank is the only thing on the island that the enemy can damage...which unlocks it, allowing them to take things. This also creates a control point for defense. Your primary concern is to defend the bank, which can't be hidden behind indestructible walls. This also reduces, to an extent, the need for a large amount of walls, and defense. You would still want them, but you won't need them all over your island. Another idea is a stable to keep breeders in. You can designate any animal to be a breeder. You take it to a Freeport, and take it to a Stable. You pay gold to keep it there. Not an exorbitant amount, but a reasonable amount. It could be that once an animal is designated a breeder, you can never take it out? Just a thought. Have a limit on how many you can have of each animal type. 1 Male, and 6 females? You can breed them on the Freeport. Stables are rented for the breeding, and then raising the baby. Alter how babies are taken care of, if necessary. Allow them to be transported on ships at an early age, so you can clear out of the Freeport, as soon as possible. This may need some thinking through, but what I am getting at here is this...much of your wealth is protected. Your months of building up breeders, is protected....BUT...many more opportunities to lose small amounts of stuff, are created by having more need to travel back and forth between Freeports. The Lawless areas surrounding Freeports, would now have a real purpose in game. They would be PvP hot spots. You would lose things, now and then, BUT, there would be no more morale killing wipes. You don't lose EVERYTHING in one day. If these methods don't work, the formula that we need is simple Create mechanics that allow you to 100% protect your stuff. Create reasons/mechanics that cause you to have to regularly put a portion of your valuable stuff at risk.

This! You don't wait until you are painting the house, and doing the landscaping, to fix issues with the foundation. I agree that there are many polish type bugs that you can let go, until near the end, but core game engine issues should be fixed right away...or sooner rather than later. Part of the PR problem is that many of these issues have been with ARK since the beginning. What gamers begin to understand is that some companies just never get around to fixing the bugs. They push out game content, and never fix the bugs. Gamers are learning that the only way to send a message, is to not buy, until the bugs are fixed. With many of these issues, they cannot wait until right before the game goes live, to finally address them. They need to fix them now, because people do come to the game between now and then, and so those bugs drive away more people who go on to tell people that the game still isn't fixed. I think there needs to be an epiphany, that EA games cannot be developed the same exact way that you would develop a non-EA game. We are talking 2 years, minimum, where people will be playing this game, before it actually goes live. A game that is basically fully developed before it goes live, can let bugs go until the end, because nobody is playing it. Think of it like this. Two restaurants are being built. One restaurant is not going to take it's first customer, until it is completely built. As it is being built, it is learned the electrical junction box for the kitchen, is the wrong one. It won't support the number of breakers that are needed, and the ones installed are too small. Additionally, the refrigerators are discovered to have a problem and don't quite get cold enough. OK, that doesn't have to be fixed right away, because no food is being stored, or prepared. However, another restaurant, with the same issues, has opened the drive thru, while the restaurant is still being worked on. They do not have the luxury of putting off those repairs until the restaurant is about to open, because they are already servicing customers.

I prefer that they rethink sails entirely, to get rid of the speed sail Meta. This is what I would do. Speed Sails - Fastest sail when sailing with the wind. Has highest durability Maneuvering Sails - Fastest Sail when sailing into the wind. Allows most maneuverability. Weight Sails - Not as fast as either sail, when sailing into the other sail's strength, but faster when sailing into their weakness. Same for durability and maneuverability. Simply allows less drop in speed as weight increases. I honestly think that if this is what they did, you would see many more sail combinations on PvP. You might even see some running with...gasp...no speed sails. While it would be good to allow some increase in speed, this should not be a drastic increase. These are not rapid fire weapons, on these ships. Nor do the rounds travel fast...meaning that if you allow speed to increase very much, those who have faster sails, will be near impossible to hit, except from point blank range. This game will definitely die, if the "haves and have nots," problem becomes exacerbated. I saw how fast people were quitting when the guillotine exploit was allowing some people to have ships that would take many hits, while stripping planks in one hit. Amazingly, people don't keep playing games when they realize they are the one at a severe disadvantage, especially when they feel they can't overcome that, and this game can easily get you into that mindset. Get wiped a few times, just as you feel you are starting to get somewhere, and you can easily start to feel it is hopeless. Like it or not, this is actually why so many people quit. The whole thing with the offline raiding was just part of that. It was simply one cause for them getting wiped, and starting to feel it was pointless to even try. Think about it..if they didn't really lose that much...if they could rebuild their ships in a half hour, and never lose their BPs, or raw materials...most would not have quit. If treasure maps, and gold were the only thing they lost in a wipe, and animals not on passive, they would not have quit. Nobody keeps playing a game when they get the message that they are the bug, and other people are the windshield...all the time, and this game gets people to thinking that very quickly. I see it in many game like this...starts out strong but very quickly, the player base drops quite quickly. ARK did pretty good for a while, but I think that was despite these reasons, not because of it. Taming dinos, new maps bringing people back, etc... It also was not as hard to get re-established as this game is. For one, people learned to spread their stuff out, over many different servers. You didn't lose everything in one wipe....plus, you could upload your best stuff, and run to another server, and download it.

Next you will accuse me of running around in all black, with my face covered, waving red and black flags. lol

Agreed...for one trip...but in a PvP setting, the efficiency of one trip is NOT your only concern, nor is it the most important concern. Not getting sunk IS the primary concern. Even a common Galleon is no joke. You do not want to lose that. With BP everything on it, you really don't want to get it sunk. So you do not sacrifice speed for a few thousand more K of cargo. Doing so will eventually cost you your ship. You might lose it anyway...ships get sunk in this game...but running slow increases that risk exponentially.

You aren't one of the adults, since you can't understand that I was not questioning his work, nor was I even criticizing it. Don't be such a snowflake, and understand that I was literally stating that decisions of the Devs have made his work all but useless for PvP...not because there is anything wrong with his work, but because the Devs are creating a Meta. They need to completely rethink the way they are doing these sails. They need to find a way...maybe the way I posted above...to make it such that all sails can be relevant, without making you sacrifice a fighting chance to escape, if you need to. As it is, speed is life. This is what the Devs have created...they didn't invent the concept...they just ignore that it is the reality, and you cannot re-invent the wheel where this is concerned. PvP players are NOT going to sacrifice that much speed. They will use speed sails, and manage the wight to keep the speed up. That simply means more trips, with less cargo, but that is what they will do, because no load of cargo is worth losing the ship...especially with BP planks, decks, cannons, and sails.

I have NO complain with your work. I am simply saying that because the Devs are making the decisions that they are making, they are making your work less relevant, especially on PvP. Frankly, if I were them, I would remove the idea of speed sails. All sails would have the same overall speed. Maneuvering sails would be better into the wind, and speed sails would be better with the wind. Weight sails would allow for more weight to be carried...just reducing the effect of weight on the ship, but be the same general speed as the other two sails. Maybe adding one would increase weight carrying, but only slightly reduce the speed. It would not be as fast as either sails, going into the respective strengths of those sails, but would be faster going into each one of those other sail's weakness. My aim would be to create a system where nobody is put at a total disadvantage with regard to speed. So long as you use the strengths of your set up to your advantage, you are never at a severe disadvantage. This would help reduce the likelihood that there would be one recognized Meta.

The part that you are missing is that you are still slower than a guy who managed his weight, with speed sails, with his ship set up to go pirating. Significantly slower, which is why on official PvP, you see almost all speed sails. Understand now? I made the suggestion for those cargo crates, but when I made the suggestion to them, a long time ago, I made it with the idea that ships would have to sacrifice some cannons, not speed, to carry more weight at the same speed as those shooting at them. I completely understand that yes, if one guy has speed sails, and overloads his ship, it will be slower than a ship with the same weight, but with weight sails. There is nothing new about that. But, you are not as fast as a guy who managed his weight, and has his ship set up to sink other ships. That's the point, and that's why speed sails will still be the meta on PvP. The concept is as old as battle...in a battle, speed is life. It didn't start with this game.

And you completely miss the point. Options have always been there, and yet Speed sails are the PvP Meta. Why? Because it doesn't matter how much you can carry, when your ship is sunk. Simple as that. If you are much slower than the other guy, you cannot run from him, if you need to. So almost everyone on PvP, runs as fast as they can. Giving the cargo crates a 40% speed hit, makes no sense. Weight sails have always been available. People on PvP, for the most part, do not like to use them...because you lose too much speed. PvE may be completely different.