RENAGAD3

like i said. NPC's are not going to do well in Island/ land claim defense. so if there is a way they can be snuck up on in any way people will be able to exploit that. but if you put mats in a stone room with NPC's watching anyway in. ppl will have a hard time 3 man raiding you. you are acting like NPC defense is useless because you created a complex maze that someone found a way around and you got raided. show me a video link where you have an enclosed building with NPC's guarding inside and out and some 3 man is able to walk right up. destroy your walls, walk in destroy your containers and leave. maybe there is an aerial blind spot that needs to be addressed but that is a completely different argument than " we need to alter the way the game works because someone was able to find a loophole in my defense in an alpha game"

well i dont think swivel guns have 360 degree range of motion. plus isnt the range on the swivel gun pretty short. the puckel gun (however you spell that) does considerably less damage but a larger range and horizontal field of view. well placed mortars can help keep ships at range and maybe even destroy smaller ones. could you create 3 sided stone walls behind NPC to protect them. sounds like your issue is with strategy not NPC AI

the game isnt inherently flawed because of this. there are limits to range/motion/and damage on all guns. There are limits to AI abilities. NPC's will never replace live players and there will always be ways to outsmart them. im in no way implying there is a way to create an impenetrable base with NPC's especially when it comes to island/land claim defense. but it would be very possible to protect specific resources and rooms with them. but there is no way to make anything in this game 100% fortified you could have a room with 50 NPCs watching every wall and could get raided by 100 live players. or maybe even 1 player with the patience to find a blind spot and line up every shot. but 25+ man raids take alot of coordination discipline i have yet to run in to many more than 3 players at a time just island hopping and trying to steal mats. if you are the target of a large coordinated raid then there is not much you could do without a large coordinated live player defense.

Im sure there are alot of issues with the NPC defense right now but i think alot of that stems from wildcard not giving us a full range of information on how things work. from what iv read in alot of the forums here the hand to hand/melee fighting is hinky right now. i have even seen a forum where they say you cant have NPC equip guns (untested just stating what i read) but it sounds like the strongest defense for base raiding is setting NPS/Swivel Gun traps inside your base and maybe put some on mortars outside. my company also surrounded a very large area with stone gates to make it harder to get boats up to our base. NPC's are not meant to be a replacement for live players. that would be unfair to companies that put in the work to recruit. so i dont think we will the day where an NPC will win a 1v1 or even 2-3 NPC vs Live player. your strength is in numbers.

I dont agree with the original post. Raiding is all part of the game and there are things you can do to defend your ship and base while offline. however this is an extreme response to an idea. not to mention the fact that the game is split between EU/NA so this idea would be easy to implement in a reasonable time frame to anyone that is supposed to be in those servers. I think its weird that this entire thread is ignoring the fact you can use NPC's to defend while offline.

Has anyone experimented with NPC's and what they can do outside of being used to control the sails and cannons manually. im wondering if i leave them mounted to the cannons will they defend my boat while im offline? can i mount cannons to my land base and have them set there to defend it if i leave gold in their personal inventory?

you could probably even solo a low level if you got good at lining the ship up then manning the cannons. it would be difficult but doable.

no conceited is right. im not referring to your view of the game. im referring to the fact that you want the game molded to fit your play style. the way they have it set up now you have to have real interactions with people and work to progress your company. but the game is still balanced so that solo players can play and have fun. granted its harder, but playable. if you tip the scale in either way it ruins the enjoyment for a whole demographic of people. not to mention that if its easier for small companies and solos to acquire NPC's could you imagine what that would do for large ones?! not saying the game is perfect but it is very difficult to make changes for solos that dont give large companies unfair advantages.

This is a Conceited way to look at games. most of the things you point out here is why most people like the game. some people like a tough grind and some are more casual. but to say that something is designed wrong or bad because it doesn't meet your play style is ignorant. i agree that the game needed some work to make the game more playable for solo or small companies. and i was very frustrated with not being able to claim land and people totally dominating lawless spawns. (i died countless times to lvl 30+ at low levels and was constantly raided making it very difficult to progress early.) however after i got to a decent level and found somewhere to put a small stone building and expand the game got a lot better. and i have killed many AoD ships with a schooner that can be built solo in a few days at most. thats where i got all my NPC's and plenty of gold to support them. Another thing id like to point out is that if you pay attention to the patch notes it really looks like they are trying to make the game more playable for solo/Small companies without taking away from the large ones. i mean they increased resource farming and taming by 2x, added neutral zones, and nerfed alot of weapons. not to mention getting rid of lawless spawns. this game is in alpha. which means they released it unfinished and its our job as the community to help make it better. and they have done a really good job at listening and reacting. the game has been out for what 2 - 2 1/2 weeks. go back and look at how many patches have come out in that time.