Salty Del

Are you suggesting that the sharp changes in angles in the cross section of a ship are caused by people having higher latency, and that by removing these players there is no need for these chines and a smoother hull shape could be made?

From my experience, the only thing you need to do is try to create a new character on your second system for the same server as the original system. If it’s still working the same, it will take you to character creation (I think, not 100% sure), and then try to log you in before taking you back to the menu with an error message, but it will then start logging in on its own with your existing character. That’s what I remember happening when my HD died and I replaced it and performed a fresh install of Windows 10.

TL; DR: Rights need to be better balanced between settlers and settlement owners. Lotus has good ideas. I don’t believe that there is a perfect answer that will make everybody happy. I think that overall the new system fixes more issues from the old system than it creates itself. It allows most people to have a space to build, even if they cannot find an island for themselves. Before I go into details, yes, our company owns a small island in the south-eastern tropics. There are no metal nodes on our island, minimal fiber, a fair amount of trees and stones , a good amount of crystal, and tons of three kinds of saps. To me, the largest issues that it creates is the potential for friction between the owners and settlers. We welcome settlers on our island, and do appreciate when they ask us about where it’s ok for them to build and where not to build. Our company is made up of four small companies or couples to get the island, and each of the groups has their own small base. We have one German settler on our island that one of our members was able to do some basic communication with. He built a nice base near one of our groups, and doesn’t cause any troubles. On the other hand, we have another settler that started building a massive base right where our main forest is. I’m not even sure what language he was speaking, as he only tried communicating once, but I tried to communicate non-verbally for him to not build in the woods. I removed the sections that he had put down in the trees, they were only a few at that point, and put up some billboards thinking that he would get the message. He didn’t. He built bigger into the trees, even up to and beside the billboards. He also built a massive pen cutting off the easiest path between the small island we’re on and the island he was on with the trees. He also built a large, walled in section, presumably to keep that area for himself, that cut off travel for all on that side of the island. I removed the offending structures and then put a few pillars down to prevent him from expanding into those areas again. There is still a large area around him to expand into, and he has built that way now, but he also started foundation spamming in the water around his base. There are several boat building bases and traps that have been left on our island, but the owners periodically come by and refresh them so we can’t remove them. We’ve asked them to remove them, and they just give a non-comital response and leave them there. I can’t really exaggerate how small our island is. On the map it looks like it’s small-medium sized, and it cost 47 points to buy, but it’s really one small island with 5 smaller islands around it, with a lot of the water being either too shallow to build a boatyard or anchor a ship leading to being too deep for a shipyard or to anchor a ship. We’ve found several shipwrecks in the shallows, and put up buoys when we find the ones extending out into the water. I think that there needs to be a rebalancing of the rights from the settlement owners and the settlers, at least in PvE. It’s too easy for the settlement owner to get screwed over by a settler for either taking a day off patrolling, or just taking a day off. At the same time, the settlers do need some form of protection from settlement owners that would just arbitrarily destroy their buildings. I think that Lotus has a great idea for a starting point by allowing the settlement owners to specify who can build on the island, and if alliances were increased for PvE then the owner could have an alliance to invite settlers to, once they have both spoken to each other and both parties expectations have been agreed upon. I also think that increasing the time for a settlement owner to be able to remove offending structures should be increased. I’d like 5 days to account for reduced play time during the week, but even 3-4 days would be adequate. If the settlement owner felt the need to evict a settler, there could be an option to flag all of a settlers buildings for demolition. That could start the 10 day destruction timer, and during that time the owner of the structures should be able to remove the structures themselves and get full resources back to rebuild in a new location. Another of Lotus’ ideas that I agree with is to increase upkeep in general, but especially for larger companies that own multiple islands. To also incentivize these companies moving to larger islands as they grow, settlement owners should be able to pickup or destroy their own structures at any time for full resources. This removes the need for them to start over again on their new island with half of the resources they already had, which is another reason for them to just stay where they are currently.

This is a pretty good summary of it. This is all just my opinion on the ships as they currently are: Galleons are actually right about where they should be. The brigantine should turn slightly slower, as it’s pretty agile for a larger ship. The brigantine should also have an extra gun port or two to be better balanced between the galleon and schooner. Schooners should be a bit slower than a brigantine, but turn tighter. Sloops need an small increase to their turning speed when sailing at speed. If you don’t depower the sails, they turn almost like a galleon. The bigger changes need to happen to the sails. Speed sails are far too effective when off the wind. They have a 150 degree arc that they can be most effective at, and that’s with them only being at peak power when directly with the wind. They should start to drop off significantly when more than 5 to 10 degrees off of the wind, and give the lowest effective speed into the wind. Say 10% speed into the wind. Handling sails are actually in an ok place, I think. If speed sails were less effective when off the wind, then they would really start to come into their own. These should give the 30% speed into the wind. Weight sails would be more effective if instead of adding addition weight to the ship, they instead reduced the movement penalty for carrying more weight. Working the same as the armour speed modifier. Top speed should be the same as a handling, but have a similar effective profile to the speed sails. These should give a 15 to 20% speed into the wind. With these changes, speed sails are most effective with the wind, handling sails are more effective off the wind, and weight sails reduce the penalty of carrying more weight. Currently, I see little reason to use anything except speed sails. Unless your ship is meant for combat, when handling may give you an advantage for sail turning speed and requiring less effort to keep with the wind for better agility. This is all just my opinion though, as I certainly haven’t tried out every scenario with every ship and sail combination.

Tamed by Panty Stocking? Sorry, I just find the name to be hilarious.

And the one who gives up loses their gold.

We put a dinghy on our galleon so that one of us can get the drop quicker that way than taking the time to turn around and head back. I think we’ll do the same thing with our planned brig, just in case we need to.

From my experience, and what the game gives you as info on the blueprints, handling sails are badly misnamed. What handling sails do is provided acceleration and give you more power at severe angles to the wind. Your speed sails have to be pretty much red before they’ll give you a boost. They also raise/lower and turn faster than the other sails. Pre-wipe, our galleon had 4 speed sails and 2 handling sails. It still turned like a pig. Our new galleon has 6 speed sails. What I’ve found helps, is to turn the sails slightly off the wind and partially close them. De-powering the sails does allow you to turn quicker, relatively speaking. Our galleon is strictly an A to B carrier. It has four rear facing cannons, and with enough time and ammo could sink any Ship of the Damned, but we put a dinghy on it to retrieve the drops, as turning it around took too long. If we’re fighting Ships of the Damned, it will be with a brig or schooner.

We haven’t gone Ship of the Damned hunting specifically, just ones we’ve incidentally encountered. We’ve mostly gotten fine and under blueprints, but we have gotten masterwork medium gunport and legendary medium plank blueprints, and I think masterwork ballista and large cannon blueprints. So better blueprints do exist, but they are rarer drops.

Only one person at a time? That’s unfortunate, if accurate. We spent three evenings out looking for a monstrous sperm whale, and found two just as we were giving up for the third time. At least those ones we all got the achievement for.

I recently built a legendary large ship yard, and the galleon I built from it has a quality of 123%. I have no idea what that means, and I likely won’t find out anytime soon, as the galleon is strictly an A-to-B ship. I do want to build a brig for Ship of the Damned hunting though. That one may see higher levels sooner.

I am so going to try this when I get home. Picturing a sloop with a diving platform and a dinghy dock WITH a dinghy, it has to look ridiculous, if you can do it.

No, I’m pretty sure that the max level is tied to the ship skeleton. Adding higher quality planks affects only those pieces.

I believe that the smallest ship you can put the diving platform or dinghy dock on is the schooner. Mentally picturing one on a sloop, all I can see is the sloop capsizing.

I've got a discord server setup, should anybody wish to join us: https://discord.gg/3mnV33s We're up to 37 island points, with a few people interested in joining, and we should have enough gold to start a claim when we get enough people. Happy sailing!

So you’re saying they have in-game customer service now?

I can see some EU players trying to get a claim on the NA PvE because they were unable to get one on EU PvE.

I’m somewhat disheartened by the new claim system. It is setup in such a way as to benefit large and very large companies, give medium sized companies some opportunities, and give very little opportunity for solo and small companies. So, this is what I’ve decided. I want to form a company that is made up of a large group of solo and small companies. I want enough players that we can take over one of the big islands. All members can interact with other company members as much or as little as they want. Keep it civil and respect other members space and feelings. I haven’t tried setting it up like this, but I would like to let everybody pin code their structures if they want. Every company member will have a plot on this island, and will be able to build whatever they want in it. People found building in uncommon or rare resource nodes will be asked to move, then unfortunately moved forcefully if they do not move. I doubt that will happen, but I want you to know beforehand. There will be a 10% tax rate on the island, but any resources besides gold will be put into a community chest so that they can be used by anybody. There will be a dock area with shipyards and crafting tables for all members that wish to use them. If you’re using a shipyard, please be able to finish your ship quickly so others can use it as well. Part if the dock area will be a place to setup a shop, with access for all visitors. There will be taming pens setup in several places around the island with unlocked gates. Anybody can use them, even companies just visiting. If you make a temporary taming pen on the island, then I just ask that you completely demolish it when you’re done. Treasure maps can be done on your own or you can ask others to join you. I find small groups to be quite enjoyable, and not cumbersome to organize. Donations for island upkeep would be greatly appreciated. Power stone runs can be organized, and eventually the kraken as well. If you want to join up, you can respond in this thread, send me a PM, and/or meet us in A5 on EU PvE. We’ll be building up supplies and gold to be ready to claim as large of an island as we’re able to. I’d like to have the group assembled by 5 PM UTC to claim the island and we can get started. Happy Sailing! Del

It’s been live for less than 24 hours, but I already have several concerns about the new claim system for PvE. There is a very finite supply of islands that a solo or small company is capable of claiming. After the 15 and 23 point islands are claimed, I think that the next point value is 53. The island points that a company can have seems to be 30 + 1 for every additional member. My wife and I have 32 island points available to use. This means that to claim even the 53 point islands, you need a minimum company size of 23. That’s quite the jump from solo, or a few friends. There is also a possibility of a large company starting off in small pieces to claim several of the smaller islands, only to merge together later. Multiple people can try to claim the same island at the same time. You end up with a confrontation with the claimers basically griefing each other until the other(s) give up. And if you’re the one that ends up losing, congratulations! You’ve lost the claim AND the gold it cost to drop the claim flag, so in the early rush you may not be able to even try again. The tax rates seem to default to 50%. 30% was stupid enough, but now in PvE you give up half of everything you farm, including gold from treasure chests, to the claim owner. Now the settlement owners can just sit there with a 50% tax rate and not have to do anything. The whole setup feels like it’s intended to cater to large companies. I haven’t done a count yet, but I believe that the majority of the islands will only be claimable by very large companies. Unless the small companies are lucky enough to get a claim early, lawless is looking like the only really viable option. Which is probably just as well, since getting gold after the islands are claimed getting gold will be twice as hard, since you’ll only get half as much. I know I’m being a bit pessimistic saying this, but they’ve really made me feel like they don’t care about PvE at all, aside from the cash the PvE players bring in when they first buy it. They remove one of the PvE maps to add a third PvP map, they setup PvE to almost solely benefit large companies, and it really seems that they didn’t think this through at all. The old system definitely had major flaws, but I think it was way better than this new claim system, at least for PvE.

Oh god. I can now see a bunch of people making characters with dark skin and naming them Kunta Kinte, saying things just like that. For the record, I am not suggesting anybody actually do that, nor do I think it would be appropriate in any way, shape or form. It would be funny for about 5 seconds, until they think about what that actually represents. I should also point out that actual slaves had no say in who their masters were. You may feel that the new claim system is like forced slavery, but in that case at least you get to shop around for your master.

For what’s being discussed here, my own testing is somewhat limited. I’m a PvE player, so my extent of testing the ability to remove others structures on our claim was to try the pinwheel once, assume the foundation was there before we claimed and move on. Giving hostile companies the ability to spam foundations on your island at anytime is far less than ideal. Perhaps this could be solved by only allowing allies to build in peace time, but anybody can build during war time. Having the timer on hostile forces ability to use land mounted artillery does sound like a good idea. They can only be placed during the war times, and the timer gives the defender a reasonable opportunity to “remove” them before they become useable. If hostile forces were allowed to drop a cannon and use it immediately, I can see them dropping several cannons, one per attacker, firing maybe two rounds, and then picking the cannon back up. They could also relocate for guerilla style attacks from different locations, forcing the defender to have to move their defence. Thankfully, that does not sound like it will be a concern with how the system sounds to be working. Not having the ability to remove structures via the pinwheel before 12 hours has lapsed is most likely a bug, and will hopefully be patched when it goes live.

You are correct, in that I did not actually try to demolish any of the structures that were built on our claimed island. I did try to use the pinwheel on one, but the option did not come up, so I assumed that was because it was built before we claimed the island. I don’t have enough interest in that feature to test it further. I provided as much feedback on the systems and things that I felt were most applicable to me. You apparently feel that other systems and things were more important, and that’s ok. That doesn’t mean that your or my feedback is more or less important, just on different parts of the game. I have not read your feedback post, but I gather that there were some comments made about it, probably in a negative fashion. I’ll look up your post when I have time later so we can discuss how our experiences were different in a constructive fashion. Thank you for your feedback.

That is certainly one possibility. The best case scenario that I see is that having other groups on your island, if you develop a good relationship with them, can provide better security for all. There’s a higher probability of somebody being around when the island is attacked, and more people available to help defend. In Empires, mega companies won’t have a need for this, but with the company size limits in Colonies there are benefits to grouping together. With the right groups of people.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot! This may have been unintentional, but you can build in the freeports. Maybe the structures there have the same decay rate as ships do?

Yes! Please do this. And make pressing escape also cancel whatever you have queued to craft in your inventory. It takes too long to stop crafting, when you’re unexpectedly attacked.