New features and changes I'd like to see added in future updates

[Vincent]

Right, so this was a document I’ve been working on since I started playing GOF: ERAS a few weeks ago, and I finally got my profile working so that I could post this ‘novel’, as some detractors on another forum might say… LOL. This is a list of features I’ve decided that I’d like to see added to the game, based on my limited experience with both GOF and a few other pirate games (New Horizons being the one I found first). Everything within this article should be taken with a grain of salt, as I make absolutely no claim to being an expert on any of these subjects, but I’ve listened to a lot of people who do know their stuff and also done a lot of reading, so I hope I can give you guys this and get some positive feedback on what could or could not be done and why or when, since it would be nice to know some details about my suggestions. I will mention that I have no skill whatsoever in modelling or programming, but I’m willing to do what I can to help you guys out with what I can – such as writing up a game manual, coming up with quest ideas and plots, researching what I can, and just acting as a general sounding board and beta tester. This mod is probably my favorite pirate game of all time so far, and I see so much potential for it to rise even higher – so I just want to help this game along in any way I can. Thanks for all your efforts to bring us this masterpiece so far, and please keep up the amazing work!
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#1. Lots of quests: I know you guys are already working on this, but I’d really like to see a lot of quests. I personally dream of having a huge, mind-boggling number of quests that run the gamut of every kind of adventure – romancing a pretty girl, escorting a convoy, sacking a Spanish treasure port, raiding the Spanish treasure fleet, pirate hunting, searching the jungles for an ancient Maya ruin said to contain a great treasure, being hired to smuggle contraband (or even spies) into an enemy harbor, freeing a bunch of slaves, spying on enemy troop/fleet movements, engaging enemy fleets in combat alongside an allied fleet, deciding whether to shut down a brothel or protect said establishment’s right to continue operating, raiding a plantation’s storehouses to steal the goods held within, eliminating a camp of bandits troubling island roads, wiping out a smuggling ring, raiding or protecting a native Indian camp, bribing or blackmailing government officials, the list goes on and on.
I think a lot of good inspiration for quests could be drawn from pirate and seafaring novels – the Master & Commander series, despite being set in the wrong time period for our game, still has a lot of good ideas hidden within its pages. The Horatio Hornblower books also make a good source of ideas despite being set in the Napoleonic period, and you could even take the ideas and basic plot concepts from old pirate movies like The Black Swan, put a new spin on them, and turn them into new ‘super’ quests – that just sounds like something that would be really fun for me to run into! Even other video games can have good quest ideas – taking a que from Skyrim, the player could be arrested for a crime and thrown into one of the gold/silver mines as a convict laborer. The result of this is a quest where the objective is to escape the prison through one of several means, such as instigating a riot, sneaking out in disguise, bribing your way out, etc.

#2. More information displayed during character selection: Things like a character’s alignment, starting ship, possibly their starting wealth, etc. would be nice to know about during character selection – it helps a player to make a more informed choice about which character they want to start their game with. The portrait and bio are very nice, and excellently done – so they add immensely to the game’s overall experience – but I think it would be helpful to have at least the character’s alignment and starting vessel included in the information we’re presented with. The options provided on the character selection screen could be moved somewhere else to make room for all this – either by sticking them in the options menu, or making them into a pop-up window that appears after you select your character and before the game loads the starting scene.
Also, the flashing national symbol works, but can be a bit hard for me to discern at first glance. Perhaps we could replace it with a flashing border around the emblem representing a character’s nation instead? That seems like it would be a bit easier to spot right off the bat.

#3. Ship modifications: The guys who built the New Horizons mod did this to a very limited extent, and I’d honestly like to see if we could include our own ship modification system in GOF: ERAs 2. Many historical captains chose to modify their vessels in some manner, whether it be something as simple as adding/removing guns, or something as elaborate as moving the masts around and cutting off certain upperworks as many pirates did. The practice of modifying and rebuilding a vessel over time was somewhat of a common practice in the 17th century as far as I’ve been led understand, and the added gameplay value would be a nice addition in my opinion. Below is a list of possible modifications I have devised so far, each with their own pros and cons;
• Broad Rudder: a broad rudder would make the ship turn faster (5-10% maneuverability increase?), but in return it could cause a minor overall speed loss once fitted – maybe 5%.
• Cotton Sails: These sails would be more expensive than standard sails, but catch the wind better and provide a speed boost – maybe 5-10%? The tradeoff is that cotton is required to repair them, making repairs somewhat more expensive, and the sails are more fragile – reducing maximum rigging HP by, say, 5%.
• Silk Sails: Silk is very closely woven, making it excellent at catching the wind and maximizing its power. This would give ships a 10-15% speed boost, but the tradeoff is very expensive repairs (due to needing silk to repair the sails) and a reduction in maximum sail HP of about 10%.
• Expanded Crew Quarters: For the captain who needs a large crew compliment to fight in boarding actions, this mod allows a ship to expand its maximum crew size by a certain percentage. The tradeoff is a reduction in cargo capacity. Perhaps we could even allow the player to select how much space they want to convert in 10% increments before buying the mod. I personally think this should be pretty cheap to buy, since it’s not a terribly complex modification, and its main (and possibly best) use would likely be to get a bunch of extra crewmen aboard a smaller starting ship, making it easier to capture a larger and/or better ship, thereby avoiding the need to save up a large amount of cash to buy it at a shipyard.
• Smuggling Compartments: This one is a tricky one to figure out the inner workings of, even for me. The point of it is to make it easier to conceal contraband goods while smuggling, so perhaps decrease cargo capacity by 5% to represent new frames used to create hidden spaces, and as a result make it 5-10% more likely the coast guard won’t show up at the rendezvous (due to not knowing about the contraband hidden in the ship’s smuggling compartments).
• Armored Hull: This mod increases a ship’s maximum hull HP by 10%, but requires it to sacrifice 10% of its cargo space to make way for stronger frames and extra hull planking. Could also result in a 5-10% reduction in top speed.
• Corsair Refit: By cutting out unnecessary deadweight and lofty superstructures, the ship can be made faster and more maneuverable (10% increase to maximum speed and maneuverability). The disadvantage is that this mod can only be obtained at pirate shipyards, and it would cost you a lot – 50% of the ship’s original value seems like a decent value to start from.
• Bombards: This mod is based primarily on my knowledge of the bomb ketches used by different navies for attacking harbors and fortifications on land – essentially, it increases your damage output against forts and other land based targets, but takes up a lot of cargo space when mounted (could be a fixed amount, or it could be a percentage, maybe 15 – 30%?). It’s possible that, for historical accuracy, only certain ships (like ketches) could mount this modification.
• Swivel Guns: This mod would increase your damage to an enemy ship’s crew, but the tradeoff is that it only works at short range. Beyond, say, 30 yards, the additional damage would have no effect. Perhaps the damage done to a target could even taper off towards the extreme end of the effective range band.
• Streamlined Hull: Increases a ship’s speed by 5%, but costs a lot (you are rebuilding the ship’s lower hull to do this, after all) and reduces cargo capacity by 5% due to the changes in the ship’s lower profile.
• Advanced Gunsights: Increases the accuracy of a ship’s guns by 5%, but needs more time to be aimed properly – represented by an increased loading time, say 5 – 10% longer?
• Extended Keel: A longer keel helps to stabilize the ship, increases the vessel’s speed by 5%, but reducing its maneuverability by 5%.
• Rapid Deploy Sails: Due to changes in the ship’s rigging, its sails can be adjusted more quickly than normal. This results in a 5% increase in a ship’s acceleration and deceleration rates, but the advanced rigging is temperamental, resulting in a 5% reduction in total Sail HP.

#4. Changeable paint schemes on ships: It might be cool if we could somehow change the skin our ship is currently using at the shipyard for a small fee, but I can also see how not including this kind of system would encourage players to try and capture a new ship if it has a paint scheme they like better than the one on their current vessel. I’m really okay with either way of doing things myself, I just thought I’d mention it as a possibility.

#5. Have the trade window optionally display settlement names and trade goods at game start: I can understand that some people wouldn’t want to play with what I’m suggesting here, so what I’d like to see is two new options in the mod settings – the first option will make the trade window in the character menu display all of the settlement names and their nationalities without having to visit the store in each of them first, and the second option would make the trade window display the different import and export lists for all of the different settlements while still requiring you to visit the stores or listen to news reports to obtain the current pricing of the different goods in that town. I’d really like to see this added so that players who like the current system can still play the game with it, and at the same time, more casual players like myself (who want to know which nations each of the different settlements belong to, and what they sell/buy, without needing to visit them first) can use the trade window to learn about these things before sailing there.

#6. Sex & Romance: Honestly, this already exists in the game to varying degrees, and in a responsible and relatively inoffensive manner, too (at least in my opinion). Personally, I’d like to see several unique marriage questlines in the final version of the game – preferably at least one or two marriage quests in the ports of each of the five nations included in the game. This provides the different characters with at least one or two marriage options that they don’t have to enter an enemy port to encounter. Also, unique character models for each of the marriage companions would be very preferable to using models seen elsewhere in the game – marrying a truly unique character who stands out feels much better than marrying “average town girl #97”, y’know? Maybe we could even include some kind of wedding scene at the end of each marriage quest.
It’d be really cool to allow our character’s new spouse to play a larger role beyond the initial marriage quest, too. Perhaps they could open up a market stall, and they would share some of the profits with us every now and then. Or maybe they could become a member of our ship’s crew (if appropriate), though that might require them to be un-killable (at the least, this should definitely be available as an option that could be turned on/off). And if the ship sinks, it could trigger a quest that requires you to find your lost spouse and reunite with them. I also think that the player should definitely be able to sleep with their wife, as it is a big part of marriage from that time period after all – essentially similar to how you can sleep with bar girls/whores, but it wouldn’t require any money. You could also open up the spouse’s house to the player, allowing them to use it to sleep like you would at a tavern, but without needing money. This helps to give marriage in the game some extra substance after the initial quest is completed, as well as some extra perks that encourage a player to carry through with it.
I’d also like to see some quests involving the brothels in some manner – talking to certain whores within them to obtain useful information, saving a kidnapped governor’s daughter from a life in the brothel, a quest where you can choose to shut the brothel down or fight for its right to do business, etc.
Honestly, it’s your game and I’m not going to get myself up in arms because the material mentioned here wasn’t included, but this is a topic that (in my understanding) existed quite prominently back then. As a result, I do feel it appropriate that a game focused on historical simulation of the period we’re recreating should incorporate the topics of sex and romance in various ways, so long as it’s all done responsibly – no one really wants to see explicit scenes, we just want to see it included in a meaningful and impactful manner.

#7. Characters start with a basic map of the Caribbean: I feel this should be something that is changed in the next release. In my opinion, any ship in the Caribbean is going to start with at least a basic map of the game’s world area – I don’t feel it appropriate for a player to go searching around for what seems like an endlessly long time at their starting port to find an Old Map among the vendors, just so that they know which way they’re supposed to sail to get where they want to go – and yes, I know that I could probably just look up a real map online, but most players are lazy bums when it comes to research of this kind, and the real map likely won’t properly match up with the in-game maps and locations anyways – nothing’s perfect, y’know? Not a huge issue, but something I felt you guys should know about for future reference.

#8. Fixed and improved cannons: Honestly, this bugs the crap out of me. First of all, let me say that I’ve only used 4-pounder guns to date, so I may not be entirely correct on all counts here. Now, to begin with, I can’t even hear my own gun reports for some reason, which really sucks – that should be fixed right quick if it’s an issue with the game itself, though it may just be me. Second, I’d like to see better gunsmoke effects. When a ship’s gun battery fires, the black powder used creates a pall of thick smoke that hangs in the air and obscures your vision somewhat, depending on how much smoke is present. The New Horizons mod does this really well, and their gunsmoke looks amazing as well (better than the current gunsmoke, anyways), and I’d like to see gunsmoke effects like that appear in this game. As I said, I’ve only used 4-pounder cannons up to this point, so I’m unsure how the bigger guns effect this – I know that the tiny charges used in the 4s would not create a huge amount of smoke, but the smoke that is created seems to fade away far too quickly – though I certainly don’t have very much experience on the topic of black powder firearms in action, so do correct me if I’m off the mark here.

#9. Game manual (with printer-friendly version): The game itself is somewhat simple to grasp onto and understand for me, but I’m a veteran gamer – I’ve been playing games, and RPGs especially, since I was ten years old. Others might not catch on so easily, and even I have a few things I still don’t understand the workings of – like how to obtain a letter of marque, or how to increase my national reputation. So, I think it would be a pretty good idea to work up a game manual that goes over the controls, game setup and options, and then explains the inner workings of the primary features of the game, and also provides explanations for some other things where it might not be immediately obvious how you accomplish them. And a version that I can print out without killing my printer and draining all the ink in the poor machine due to extraneous page decorations would be very much appreciated.

#10. More land areas to explore: Again, having not been playing the game for too long I don’t know a huge amount about the exploration on land, but I’d still like to see a lot of places to explore. The maps often show one cave, a few shorelines, and a port or two, but more areas to explore would be amazing. Using Jamaica as an example, we could allow players to explore a historically-accurate shipyard (which is something I’d really like to do), parts of the island’s mountain range, the gold and silver mines, a few plantations, any other industries producing the goods exported by the island, as well as the fort protecting the Port Royal anchorage, a few bandit hideouts, thick jungles full of leopards, monkeys and parrots, native Indian camps, and a number of sandy beaches where smuggling handoffs could occur, switching locations every now and again to throw off the coast guard.
The best part is that all of these new areas open up a wide breadth of opportunity for incorporating new encounters, interesting NPCs, and unique and engaging quests (like escaping the gold mine after being sent there as punishment for a crime, or even protecting it from bandits/unscrupulous officials, eliminating a group of nasty bandits, hunting exotic animals to make some extra cash selling them in town, freeing a prisoner/ally from the fort prison, freeing the slaves or putting down a slave rebellion at one of the plantations, sneaking into the plantation warehouse to steal the cargo inside it – if native Indian camps were included, you could even include marriage questlines in some of them – or a quest inspired by the cannibal tribe scenes in Pirates of the Caribbean 2).

#11. Readable Books: Ever since The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim came out, I’ve been spoiled in this regard. I’d really like to see you guys add a similar system that allows us to write semi-lengthy books and then page through them at our leisure. It would be really cool to sit down in the tavern and read a book about naval tactics of the 17th century, in my opinion. By adding these kinds of books and making them dirt cheap (no more than 100 coins each, by my reckoning) and not having them give skill bonuses, you have an easy way to add in period-appropriate flavor material – things like 17th century storybooks, tactics and strategy manuals, job guides, swordfighting manuals, erotica (LOL), riddles and poems, history lessons, helpful tips and tricks, song lyrics, private journals, notes and letters, letters of marque and other licenses, and so much more. Please?

#12. Larger Settlements/Towns: This ties in somewhat with my request for more areas to explore on land. The current towns honestly seem really small, especially when I’ve been led to believe that certain settlements were actually rather large (like Havana or Port Royal). I can understand keeping an area small enough that it doesn’t demand insane amounts of computing power, and also that there might be constraints on the number of NPCs that can populate a location at any one time (Make an area too large with too few NPCs and it looks empty and depopulated, after all). Nonetheless, I’d like to see more places to explore in towns, even if they have to be separated by loading screens. In Port Royal, for example, I’d like to be able to explore an accurate rendition of a 17th century shipyard, a docks district with several docked merchant ships and dockside warehouses (and possibly cargo cranes inspired by those from the Port Royal movie set in the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie), a residential district for the middle and high class citizens, a slums district for poorer people, an opium den, a Royal Navy headquarters, a merchant’s guild, etc. This has the added benefit of creating contrast between larger settlements like Port Royal, Porto Bello, and Havana, and smaller, less-populous places like pirate towns, Bridgetown, etc.
I think great inspiration (and perhaps even whole models if necessary) for these new locations/buildings could best be drawn from Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, Pirates of the Burning Sea, and Pirates of the Caribbean Online.

#13. Is there any way we can stop storms from flooding settlements while sailing near them?: Yeah, I noticed this while I was riding out storms next a few settlements; the water level had risen high enough to flood the fort and settlement – it was kind of funny to watch and made me laugh a bit, but it was also rather visually unappealing in a game that tries so hard to create a realistic experience for its players. Is there any way we can fix this, or is it just going to be a quirk we’re stuck with?

#14. Allow weather changes on the ocean to affect settlements: I spent a crap-ton of money staying overnight time and time again in the tavern at Bridgetown, trying to wait out a storm before setting sail (it was at least 200 pieces-of-eight, possibly more). The reason for this was that after I docked in the midst of a gale, the weather in the settlement remained stormy for the entire time I was there, when it had long since cleared on the open seas – I only found out the truth after getting fed up of waiting and setting off despite thinking I would have to weather out the storm again, when in fact the storm was actually long gone. Is there any way we can fix this so that the weather affecting a settlement’s harbor, and any changes in that weather, are reflected on the weather conditions seen while a player is inside a settlement? That would be really helpful in gauging when a storm has finished passing over so you can set sail without throwing your ship into a gale.

#15. Wider diversity in starting ships: While some characters start with more wealth and a unique vessel that they possessed in real life, a lot of them start with the plain old Coastal Bark. While I can understand that said ship is a good, basic starting point, I’d like to see some more variety in the starting ships each character gets when starting the game. This would certainly increase replay value, since each character gets a slightly different vessel with different gameplay characteristics whenever you begin a new game. And the coastal bark is a tier 6 ship – it seems like there are enough tier 6 vessels, such as sloops, brigantines, early Spanish galleons, caravels, luggers, tartanes, barque longues, etc. to provide the selectable characters that don’t already have a unique ship with a good variety of starting vessels. As I said, this helps to make each character more unique, making the start of each adventure slightly different, and it also helps to encourage players to branch out and try playing different characters that they might not have considered using at first.

#16. Possible extra ‘Main’ quests: I haven’t played with Peter Blood yet, but from what I know, it seems that he has the only overarching ‘main’ quest currently included in the game. I think that it might be a good idea to consider writing up and implementing a ‘main’ quest for several other player characters as well, since this would massively increase the mod’s replay value, something that I’ve learned is very important to a good video game. By referencing historical events and using them to create campaign stories for our historical characters, we can create a number of ‘main’ campaign stories for players to explore alongside regular free-play. Bartolemeu Portugeus, Henry Morgan, even Tavish Greaves (my favorite RPC so far) – many of our playable characters have rich and often amazing stories from real life that could very easily become the makings of an epic campaign story in this mod. Yes, such additions to the game would require a lot of work to accomplish, but it adds a huge amount of playable content and enjoyment to the game, even after you’ve played it a few times already. You could even include these new, historically-based story campaigns in purchasable DLC packs, I know I’d buy them for sure!

#17. Have random citizens be a bit more helpful: Honestly, I got quite annoyed when I tried talking to people in town for a bit of history or other knowledge, directions, or just help in general – only for all of them to blow me off. I’d like to see a bit of a change in this regard, with people generally being more useful and giving directions or hints/helpful information, while still having some of a town’s NPCs react in the way that they currently do – this creates a more immersive experience, with some people being helpful and others telling you to get out of their faces, rather than everybody reacting one way or the other.

#18. Make the import and export identification in the merchant screen more clear: I’m slightly colorblind, so the blue text stands out fine, but the green and white text is harder to differentiate between, and there seems to be no red markers for contraband in my game. Is there a way to make import/export/contraband entries in the merchant window more clearly discernible? I don’t know which way would be best , but a change might be a good idea.

[Stéphane]

That’s a long post 🙂

i will particulary be very interested with some personal introduction quest line, like the peter blood one, for a lot of characters.
Precisely, for the characters starting with some advantage, so in a way, the player need to earn it doing a quest line … but this will be a lot of work !

[Jeffrey]

Hmmm, a novel? Contrary to that ‘other’ reaction in ‘some places,’ we don’t respond with essentially a TL;DR, I actually enjoy reading lengthy thoughts. I will respond to some of them.

1. The mind-boggling number of quests/side quests. Indeed, this has been the topic of conversation between MK and myself and he is of similar mind. In fact, some of his stated desires match some of yours. Particularly, the option for additional romance/marriage (as you further in your #6 point), expanding beyond Isabella…our initial idea would be to add someone the exact opposite of the ‘high maintenance’ Isabella, that one could strive to gain affection through deed and eventually marry.

Your other ideas in #1 are some good ones that we could add to the mix that MK as been formulating.

2. I think this might be OK. But myself, I actually prefer the subtle hints about who has money/success/wealth in the bio’s gives a hint about what that character might start, and I might be inclined to keep that as it is a nice surprise upon new game start. Though I agree maybe some of the other characters that start with a default Barque could use some adjustment. Also, you mention starting alignment and frankly, if one selects the character, I think automatically start at neutral, though if not selected, they have been adjusted to fit a pre-defined range based on their historical personality (completely random for some other, though). Maybe we should force a player select to fit that same range too. So if you choose a notorious killer, but decide you want to become a hero, well, it’s gonna take some work to crawl up the scale. Your ideas are certainly open to further discussion.

The flag display could probably be adjusted to make it more prominent, as you note the ‘glow’ effect is a bit faint and ambiguous.

3. Interesting thoughts on what I presume to be attributes/perks to ship facets, outside the existing ‘shipyard’ boosts? Things a player can perhaps earn and develop on their own? I’ll be curious to hear MK’s input, regarding your ideas. These things can certainly be done.

4. I think it would be a nice feature for those extra ‘hull’ options already in the game, to be changed for like you mention, a small fee. We could simply add a feature to review/change the existing hull textures for a paricular ship for like you say, a small fee.

5. A toggle for game option to getting/displaying the initial trade values from the very start, without requiring a visit…certainly doable for the ‘lazy’ player, LOL. We can talk about it.

6. “Also, unique character models for each of the marriage companions would be very preferable to using models seen elsewhere in the game – marrying a truly unique character who stands out feels much better than marrying “average town girl #97”, y’know? Maybe we could even include some kind of wedding scene at the end of each marriage quest.” — Already an idea that’s been discussed and in intial stages of planning.

“Or maybe they could become a member of our ship’s crew (if appropriate), though that might require them to be un-killable (at the least, this should definitely be available as an option that could be turned on/off). And if the ship sinks, it could trigger a quest that requires you to find your lost spouse and reunite with them.” — I really like this idea about teaming up with a spouse. There is already some precedent with Laurens de Graaf and Anne Dieu-Le-Veut. I also believe Anne Bonney married a common sailor, so perhaps something could be worked into a plot for that scenario…other might require a slight rework of ‘history’ but would add to the game.

“You could also open up the spouse’s house to the player, allowing them to use it to sleep like you would at a tavern, but without needing money. This helps to give marriage in the game some extra substance after the initial quest is completed, as well as some extra perks that encourage a player to carry through with it.” Yes, similar to how Isabella works, but we want to add actual ‘benefits’ to some additional marriage scenarios, instead of the constant ‘drain without much benefit’ that Isabella offers, but get a spouse that is ‘helpful’ to the player :).

7. Agree, at least start with a basic map.

8. In 2.8, the particle effects are actually a binary file that is not editable like the old 2.0 was with their .ini files, so that’s why particle effects have remained static and whatever the original game offered. In many ways, these effects are ‘better’ in the sense there are far more options for manipulation, but to date, they could not be changed. However, I have since output those binary files as XML, then built a feature to read those same XML files into the game to get the exact same effects. What this means, is they can now be edited/changed. But, what still remains, is an actual understanding of what the many values actually do, and how to manipulate them to achieve different effects. So, this XML format I devised remains unused as a way to change those effects, but now gives us the opportunity to perhaps learn how to adjust them; we will have to work/experiment further. I will say though, that my experience with larger cannons, in first person mode, shows considerable smoke (albeit fairly light colored, as opposed to a darker/sootier effect you are looking for), that does linger a bit, so maybe take a look at those to see if it more closely resembles what you are looking for? We will need some time to figure out how/what to adjust for different effects, but at least it might be doable now that I have a way to hand edit previously uneditable .xps particle files.

9. I think MK is working on a more substantial in-game manual. I also have a .pdf copy of the original COAS, where much still pertains and is relevant to things like the letter of marque and such, so we should add that info, too.

10. More places to explore, along with previously unseen location types, is already being worked by MK.

11. “…not having them give skill bonuses, you have an easy way to add in period-appropriate flavor material – things like 17th century storybooks, tactics and strategy manuals, job guides, swordfighting manuals, erotica (LOL), riddles and poems, history lessons, helpful tips and tricks, song lyrics, private journals, notes and letters, letters of marque and other licenses, and so much more. Please?” Ha! Sounds fun. Get on that MK! Interesting idea, but myself would have to punt that to our resident historian, MK. Looks like he’s got a lot of work to do now 🙂

12. This also has been an idea/task MK has wanted to work out. He’s mentioned making Havana much larger.

13. I’m not real familiar with the storm mechanics and haven’t ever looked at a nearby port during a storm, but I think you are correct that a storm involves a sea level rise as part of its definition. Not sure if that is required for effect or not, and would have to investigate.

14. “The reason for this was that after I docked in the midst of a gale, the weather in the settlement remained stormy for the entire time I was there, when it had long since cleared on the open seas – I only found out the truth after getting fed up of waiting and setting off despite thinking I would have to weather out the storm again, when in fact the storm was actually long gone.” Hmmm, didn’t know that happened and I agree that weather on the world-map/open sea shoud match. In a slight reversal, we’ve discussed making storms last longer in some cases, as they pass very quickly. But, they should still match worldmap/open sea/land. We will look at this as time allows.

15. Yes, as noted in #2, I think too many characters get a default ship that can certainly be made more unique, given the vast array of ship types we already have available in the game.

16. I think maybe this idea of more ‘main’ quests might be something we incorporate into those ‘historical scenario’ starts we are in the process of developing.

17. Another idea we’ve already discussed and will work is for some citizens to provide more use. I also understand your idea about asking for ‘information about the town’ and they are very often generic, non-responses. That could be changed, and perhaps better randomized and specific to the actual location, but that would require a fair amount of work in the dialog features. Can be done, but might be low priority beyond the first thing I mentioned, where we plan to have a way for citizens to provide the character with some extra opportunities.

18. ” I’m slightly colorblind, so the blue text stands out fine, but the green and white text is harder to differentiate between, and there seems to be no red markers for contraband in my game.” This is good information. Will have to figure out a way to achieve the differentiation with either different color schemes (not relying on red/green), or some other fashion. Thanks for bringing that to attention.

In all, you have some great input for us to consider, so thanks for taking the time. Again, I actually enjoy ‘novels’ 🙂

[modernknight1]

WOW! Vincent WOW!,

I have thoroughly read your “novel” and I am impressed with both the dedication to get the ideas out there and several that we had not thought about before. This is awesome! Thank you bud! We will definitely do some of the things you suggest.

FIRST OFF though: Let me express my thanks by telling you that with your long thoughtful AND thought provoking post – you have earned a PM from me that will have a link to the newest update with a lot of new content!

As our legal review ends and licensing gets closer, we are beginning to split the free version and paid version into two separate downloads. A lot of the free content in the next download will eventually be free to everyone, but we have decided to make it time released now. This way loyal contributing members are rewarded by getting links to the latest downloaded content, and lurkers and the rest will have to wait for months beyond to get the same stuff.

This new download will be ready in less than a week and it has a lot of really nice new stuff in it. So expect that message with your own private link to the content in a few days. Congratulations!

NOW LETS TALK ABOUT YOUR IDEAS!

First of all QUESTS. Yes indeed, this is something we very badly want ourselves. Jeffrey and I have both been learning and figuring out how this works for a long while now. So much of it is cryptic and disorganized. There are dialogue files all over the place. We have agreed as we add new quests we are going to make this more organized. We have been planning to put many new quests and quest based ideas into place in the future. A HUGE reason for all of the additional characters is to accommodate that. In addition, one of the reasons for all of the new locations going in the game is for the same reason.

Some of our new characters are just perfect for quests – real historical quests that are based on events which actually occurred! SPOILER ALERT:

I said not many new characters were coming but we have selected five new ones. A new female I will not name now.

Jeremiah Basse: Colonial Governor of New Jersey who was actually captured by pirates in the Caribbean. He hated piracy and wrote against the practice being supported by local businesses and corrupt officials. At one point he deliberately tried to sabotage the efforts of known pirates in his district AND he outfitted his own privateer ship!

Michel le Basque: No need to explain. This is a VERY famous pirate. Just look up the name. I totally forgot and neglected to put him in. He should have been in with my very first batch. So he is being included now really just to correct the historical omission.

Alonso Ramirez: This is another real character from history – the subject of a new book HOT off the presses from the University of Texas press in Austin, by Fabio Lopez Lazaro. I ordered this book before it was even printed and am reading it now. The book is called The Misfortunes of Alonso Ramirez and was first published in Spanish in Mexico in 1690. So here we have a first hand account which predates “Captain Johnson’s” a.k.a. Daniel Defoe’s 1724 book. I plan to do a review of it in the next month or two. Ramirez was a Spanish sailor captured by pirates and became a pirate! An account of a SPANISH PIRATE! Won’t spoil this anymore, but JUST HAD TO MAKE HIM A CHARACTER IN THE GAME!

Nicolas de Larraspuru: NOW here is an interesting one! This guy’s father was an fascinating character himself who spent much of his life in the Caribbean protecting Spanish shipping. He was a great admiral with an excellent reputation. He successfully brought numerous treasure fleets home to Spain and faced off with the infamous Dutch pirate Cornelis “Peg Leg” Jol. I would include him but he died in the 1630s before our timeframe (an ERAS Module 1 character along with Jol).

So his son Nicolas followed a different path. He went with his father to sea as a boy and young man but entered both the Jesuit Order and some secretive Knightly orders. He became a tool of government. He was deadly with the sword and dagger. He became a violent extension of Spanish and Jesuit power in the Caribbean. He was probably the most vicious, effective, and efficient killer the Spanish crown had in their colonial employ. In short, what we have here is a REAL TRUE HISTORICAL ASSASSIN! This man is known to have dispatched dozens in his duties and his historical reputation listed in old Spanish sources say that people were filled with fear and dread – just in the mention of his name.

Now THAT is a super villain if I have ever seen one – ONE which I will fully and completely exploit in our future questline adventures!

I have been working on a new questline for a long time that will be the first new one and goes along with your ideas for romance and marriage as well. Using the Isabella questline as a template, I have been making a questline where you will meet Anneke, a nobleman’s daughter in Willemstad. The adventure is much the same as Isabella, but she is a blond beauty and is the opposite of Isabella, because if you succeed the quest and marry her – when you come home, she rewards YOU with new useful items and encourages your piratical ways.

Jeffrey and I have also discussed having the ability to marry any girl in the game you want to if you start pursuing her with the correct selected dialogue. Part of any marriage quest will be procuring your own house which you will not be able to do until you achieve a certain level. You cannot marry until you have the house and your reputation with that colony must be perfect in order to buy a house there.

Right now Jeffrey is working on ways to make the characters on the streets much more interesting just as you suggested. He is working on women in the streets and that you meet in homes occasionally propositioning you just as the bar maids in the pubs do. Also he is working on a dialogue for random men on the streets and shop-owners asking you if you might be interested in a ship they have come into in trade or inheritance which is of no use to them. He is also working on characters that you run into in the interior jungles as being Boucaniers that have food, rum, medicine, and leather for sale for your ship(s).

Two things are delaying our priorities on working on questlines at the present.

1) We are hoping in our dialogue with the Russian teams of modders/developers that we might be able to learn how to acquire and use developer toolkit appliances that they clear have and we do not. Jeffrey believes that these tools may not have been included with the original free distribution of sourcecode by Akella to many different groups from 2009-2011 with download links provided on several prominent Russian forums. A lot of people seem to think that this distribution was special just to Pirates Ahoy! and that couldn’t be further from the truth. They were just one of many groups and individuals who were given access. However, where do we get the developer plug-ins that go with this source? Now if we could get that tool kit we could get AMAZING work done SO MUCH FASTER than we can now. It will be done either way, but we are hoping someone will trade or give us these tools.

2) I really want to get all of the new locations in the game and complete before we begin importing and building new questlines. I will tell everyone when all new colonies are complete and we can begin quest building. I like your ideas taking things from Hornblower and Aubrey-Maturin, but I will tell you that Sabatini is better and most anything they put in those novels had already been done somewhere else before. I will also say that adventures from real history are even better still. We will definitely consider those works of fiction you mention for Module 3.

Love the Maya ruins ideas. The temple from POTC is definitely being imported for a new jungle location and adventure.
Love the captured prisoner/convict idea having to escape. There are numerous mine/cave models I already have in my possession from some of the other Russian Corsairs releases by Seven Winds and BGT. I also have VCO locations but they need to be rescaled.

I love your ideas on ship improvements and Jeffrey and I have talked about adding Age of Pirates 1 Caribbean Tales ship interface improvements for Bronze or Iron guns back into this game. So other improvements as you suggest might be possible. This is one thing I really love that Caribbean: Blood and Gold (Mount and Blade) has done REALLY WELL. (BTW I am still planning to mod this game if we can figure out how to get our ships into their format so it has many new ships)
They have a bunch of good improvements you can make to your ships.

The changeable paint schemes thing is very doable, but is just going to take a lot of time because it requires a unique screenshot of every skin in the game for it to be possible. That’s over 600 different skins!!! I would also love that feature. I often hunt for my favorite skin of a given ship – this can be difficult when they randomly occur and some of our ships have over 7 different skins! It would be nice just to take it to a shipyard and buy the skin you like on that ship of your choice.

Love the ideas about getting useful information from Brothel whores, Jeffrey and I had discussed doing that same thing with your wife in future wife quests. She will have all rumors available.

If you are having gun sound problems it make me believe that you are running an older version of the mod or have something set up wrong. I have told people coming over from GOG that they SHOULD NOT put our mod on top of the GOG version. They will screw everything up. Our game is stand-alone. Unpack and play without putting it on top of anything. Make certain you look at the read me and make certain you look at setting your game config file in properties to Win7 or XP compatible.

I have been working on a game manual forever with all ships, items and characters with definitions available in the game. This with tips and game tweaks. My plan is to incorporate it into the actual game itself like the logbook Nautical Quiz answers, history, etc… I would welcome any help on getting this done. Its a back water priority for me right now with everything else I am working on.

Agree on your comments on books and also larger locations. I would like to import POTC’s version of San Juan to replace our San Juan. This is something we will look into once all of the new locations are in place.

Love the ideas about citizens having more information. It would be fun and annoying for some people LOL. Imagine talking to a man, and he says, “I can tell you are new to our town, let me tell you our history…” HA!

Your comments about replayablility is a large part of the reason we have so much variety in our game. Some have idiotically and thoughtlessly accused us of building “shovelware” but that is not the case. Only the best of what’s available is in here and the large amounts of so many different things, people and locations means that EVERY ADVENTURE WILL BE MUCH DIFFERENT from the one before. Replayability baby!!! Yeah!!!

Thanks so much again for your AWESOME POST!

MK

• This reply was modified 7 years, 4 months ago by modernknight1.

[Capt Qbert]

Hello fellow Captains,
This will be my 1st official post. 🙂

First off, I wanted to send a HUGE thank you to MK for helping me through the sing up process! Thank you!!! I hope to be a regular contributor going forward. I also work in mobile web/software QA so will be happy to help squash bugs and provide improvements when and where possible between work and my kiddos. MK, please just let me know how I can best help support your team!

2nd…another gigantic thank you to MK and Jeffrey for taking this game and making it playable the way it was intended…and far beyond as well. Amazing what you guys have done, and also thanks to the others involved (I apologize as I don’t know everyone yet being a relative newbie to the Buccaneers Reef site and only just getting into the ERAs game level 10 so far). I played the original Sea Dogs and was so happy to find this updated version of AOP2 COAS.

3rd…Vincent, good to meet you and what a tremendous write up! You put a lot of time and thought into your post and it shows. Great stuff!!! If I may expand upon a couple of points you brought up and add a few…

#6: Yes, on more options here. I really like the ‘low maintenance’ option…maybe 4-6 marriable ones with different ‘bonuses’ etc. I remember ‘wench hopping’ in Skyrim until I found the right one and settled down. It was really cool to have a home to take a break from dragon hunting and giant launching (if you know what I mean, here).

#7: Yes please…a base map would be cool. I ended up getting a nice map on my iphone so I could use that as I navigate the Caribbean, very helpful and big timesaver as I don’t get a ton of time to play weeknights (I’m a late night captain…the pirate comes out once the kids go to sleep).

#9: I got the original pdf off the web somewhere but I would love to see a manual with MKs thoughts and tips as mentioned by Jeffrey, especially on any of the added content or somewhat confusing base content (mostly how to navigate the UI stuff). I, like Vincent, am a seasoned gamer (The Magic Candle and Wizard’s Crown in the 80s where some of my favs) so figured most of it out pretty quickly but this would be helpful to everyone who plays this great game.

#10 Expansion to Vincent’s thoughts: I would love it if the game could have a compass in the top right corner or some type of mini map/static display so you know where you are on the current landmass. I know I’m still learning the ropes, but I got so turned around and confused the other night on Cuba…started off in Havana looking for the grotto, found it eventually, completed the church quest but then got totally turned around and ended up in Santiago, then in Puerto Principe on the way back to Havana. Several beaches later, I finally got back to Havana. I know store bought maps can help this or if the landmass is smaller, then not so much of an issue but some form of indicator of where you currently are beyond ‘jungle’ for navigation would be helpful if possible within the game engine.

Here are a few new ones (apologies if they have been brought up in the past, I have reviewed/searched a good chunk of the forum but not all so totally rookie move here possibly)…

#19: Easier inventory management with your officers. This is one of my biggest frustrations (it’s actually not too frustrating but time consuming and adds a lot of clicks). It would be awesome if you could trade with them not just when they are fighters but in any crew position. Or, something like the ship to ship inventory system where you can just click on left/right arrow icons for goods and they transfer between ships. I know there is a difference between ship goods and personal items but some way of being able to easily trade between you and your crew (and even crew to crew or 2nd to 3rd ship rather than the one you are captain of) would be a very good feature to add if possible for inventory management efficiency. Maybe I am missing some way to transfer goods easier that assigning to a crew member to a fighter position so let me know if that is the case! Tnx! 🙂

#20: The ‘Transfer Goods’ button. Add a warning if possible that all goods will be transferred if you click this button. LOL, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve hit this button thinking it will bring up an inventory screen rather that it moving all the goods from the 2nd ship to my primary ship. I know, this is a total greenhorn move but I keep doing this (brain error? Possibly!).

Ok, that’s all for now off the top of my head. Gotta get back to work but as I play tonight I’ll jot down any other items and add them in the next few days.

Any feedback more than welcome!
Arrrrby mates,
Captain Qbert

[Vincent]

Thanks for the awesome responses, guys! I actually posted a similar document on PiratesAhoy! after first finding their New Horizons mod, but their negative responses basically killed any interest I had in their community – I can see what you meant whenever you talked about them in your articles. Really nice to see that the people here are much better in that respect, it’s very refreshing.

Just to let you know, my favorite character so far is Tavish Greaves, so any new content involving him would be received with much excitement on my part. I have yet to do any research of my own on him, I’ve been too busy playing GOF, but I’d love to see him get a unique starting ship, and a starting quest if you guys have the time for it – he’s just such a cool character in my opinion.

On the topic of number 5, one of the things I really want the most is some way to know which nations own different settlements – that way I don’t waste time accidentally sailing to a Dutch port while flying a British flag when they’re at war. It would also be nice to know what islands the different settlements are on.

Jeffrey, section #3 was intended to discuss the addition of optional ‘add-ons’ that a player could add to their vessel after you’ve acquired it. In essence, each ship would have, say, four ‘upgrade slots’ – each one of these upgrade slots can be used to add one of the modifications that I listed, which would improve your ship’s abilities in some manner, though my idea was that you also have to deal with a bit of performance degradation elsewhere to balance out the new improvement – you can’t be super fast and super maneuverable at the same time in real life, and it also adds some extra decision making to the choice of which mods to install.

MK, I did install the game as a standalone installation, since that was pretty clear to me from the beginning as a requirement for it to function – I don’t even have the GOG version of COAS, I found this first and decided to stick with it. Maybe my system is slightly funky or something, or maybe my hearing ain’t right. Just to mention, I’m running the game on an older HP laptop from about 2014, and have had no issues so far, so you’re game is definitely good when it comes to system compatibility. Congrats!

And before my outro, four more ideas that just came to me earlier today while playing a session of GOF;
#21. Allow players to transition from the docks to their ship’s cabin and vice versa: Honestly, this would be really nice to have. By removing the necessity of going to the open sea first and then the cabin or dock, the player can more easily access the ship chest and bed. While it may remove some of the need to pay for overnight tavern stays, the tavern still has to be visited in order to do certain things, and you still have to rent a room to find the hidden loot you’ll sometimes get if you stay in the tavern.

#22. More areas on the ship to explore: Adding a deck to the ships that you can explore would be pretty awesome right? Especially for the Spanish galleon Orazio has recently made. One other place that might be a good addition to the ship maps is a generic ‘crew quarters’, where you can talk with your officers and trade equipment with them – this could be a possible solution for one of the things Captain QBert talked about. Just as an added thought, perhaps the standard cargo hold (when not in combat) could reflect your cargo load, slowly filling up as you stuff more things inside it.

#21. Add loot to chest in lighthouses and tavern room cupboards: It kinda bugs me when you can open these containers, but never find anything in them. Any change here would be nice – even if it’s just some bandages, grapes or other plain and useless stuff.

#22. Can we fire officers?: Honestly not sure if we can, but would be nice to have (I know I got one officer I’d like to fire after glancing at his reputation and skills upon finding one I liked batter). Doesn’t seem like it would be too hard to do if we can’t already – if we can, can someone explain how to do it? Please and thank you.

MK, I want to say thanks so much for the early access to the new game version, it really means a lot to know that you enjoyed my post enough to reward me for it, and that I was able to contribute something meaningful to your awesome project. I really consider the new game download just a nice bonus and a pleasant surprise, since your comments on my post are what I enjoyed the most about your responses. You guys have already made an awesome game, and I really do enjoy playing it. As a result, I decided I wanted to try and contribute to your efforts in some manner, despite my lack of programming or modeling skills. This is one way, and I intend to think about some possible quest ideas in the future and write up basic plot concepts for them – then I can post them on the forums so you guys can go over them and use them as ideas. Hopefully you’ll find a few of them interesting enoguh to use either as inspiration or wholesale!

[Capt Qbert]

Hey Vincent,

Re #22…yes you can!

1. Click (or double click or hit enter, I cant recall right now) on his current assignment/picture in the Character tab list and dismiss him.
2. Then from the Passenger list, assign that officer to a Fighter role
3. Next, just talk to him and select the option along the lines that his services are no longer needed, they will ask you to confirm (and tell you they will never work for you again if you fire them) and if you say yes, they are removed from your crew!

Done and done!

[Vincent]

Thanks!

[chris gardner]

“More information displayed during character selection: Things like a character’s alignment, starting ship, possibly their starting wealth, etc. would be nice to know about during character selection – it helps a player to make a more informed choice about which character they want to start their game with”

I really like this idea

[Maltacus]

Q: Is there any possibility of making your ships turn rate dependant on the speed? Ships spinning on the spot is sad (even sadder when it wasn’t implemented despite several rather similar games being published in the series). I know the issue was mitigated a lot by editing the ship ai so opponents spin much less but the players ship still can.

Q: Is it possible to include a bonus, or bonuses, for raking fire?

Q: Damage to masts is editable as I understand it. Could it be linked to a choice in the menu, just like realistic spyglasses, surrendering and so on? Dismasting is liked by some and disliked by some, I am sure.

[Oldtimer]

@Vincent

Lots of good ideas from you(and not only) here but I disagree on not being able to have a ship that is both superfast and supermanouverable. You can, think of torpedo boats and similar.
The trade off here should be sensitivity to damage. Glass-jawed punchers is what we would get.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Oldtimer]

Hi all,

Re quests, I think that in addition to national and pirate questlines we should also have one for smugglers. I like smuggling…

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Vincent]

Lots of good ideas from you(and not only) here but I disagree on not being able to have a ship that is both superfast and supermanouverable. You can, think of torpedo boats and similar.
The trade off here should be sensitivity to damage. Glass-jawed punchers is what we would get.

Interesting idea, Oldtimer, and I kind of like it. My objective with my upgrade suggestions was a result of my view on them – I personally think that most of them should not be extremely expensive as they are now, but should instead be quite affordable; they would then be balanced in-game using some kind of performance tradeoff – you’re getting a boost in one ability, but something has to suffer in return for that benefit. An upper limit on how many mods you can apply to your ship at one time also seems like a reasonable way to balance the system, since it means you can’t have all the mods on a single ship, and some mods could be permanent (such as reinforced hull timbers?) because they’re difficult to remove without tearing the whole ship apart, adding more long-term impacts on the choices you make when modifying/upgrading your ships. Anyone have thoughts about this?

[ians]

Local papers or news,listed bountys listing the crimes of player or npc would be good.

[modernknight1]

I have to tell you guys that I think this is quite possibly my favorite topic on this website.

Jeffrey and I continue to discuss your ideas. Orazio’s motivation has been for a more immersive and realistic world from the beginning and he’s has done so much to make that happen. I plan to hit him up tonight in a PM for yet another favor. Now that we have Class 7 ships with cabins, I want an even smaller cabin model with no cannons, maybe one little window in the back wall and a hammock and chest and that’s it – bare bones.

Re reading all of this caused Jeffrey and I to have a long conversation about which of these were the best ideas, the easiest to implement and the fastest to implement – we both continue to modify and extend our priority lists.

Certainly the ship modification ideas are very doable and that will be more work on my part than anything else because it will be visual. Along that same vein, Jeffrey and I have discussed a fouled bottom attribute which over time which will cause your ship to move slower and slower. When you take it to the shipyard for repairs, it will be an extra fee and take extra time to have your bottom Careened. You can also do it yourself at a secluded beach if you buy tar, pitch, sulfur, timbers, oil and paint, but it will take longer – and there is a chance you can be attacked and will be very vulnerable during that time.

I also love the Convoy escort idea. So this fits nicely with opening up the warehouse as a new building as all of the towns have them. I will use the money lender interior probably. In Dutch towns it will be West India Company Headquarters, in English Towns, RN Headquarters, etc… There will be naval officers there and you won’t be able to take escort missions unless you have a letter of marque or commission from your government. If your ship(s) is/are too small you will be turned away unless its a very small convoy. This shouldn’t take a great deal of effort and could really make for some fun questing.

Thanks for the continuing input.

MK

[Vincent]

AS I said in an earlier post, I think perhaps an officer’s wardroom on the player’s ship would be a good idea – as I mentioned before, it could even just be the cargo hold, though I’d prefer to have a simple room with (maybe with some bunks) that has enough room to move around in and is shared between all the different ships. All I want is a space where my officers can go while they’re on my ship and I can visit them, which accomplishes two things – first, it keeps fighter officers out of the captain’s cabin, which is often cramped enough already! Secondly, it provides easy access to non-fighter officers such as gunners and navigators, allowing you to hand them skill items, maps, etc. without needing to mess around with crew assignments all the time just top trade things – the current method works, but I’m not a big fan of it.

Wanted posters on the front of the tavern would be cool – it could be used to reflect a player’s past choices, and perhaps even give hints about where a player could find the target of a quest. It could also add dlavor to the world by detailing the exploits of other captains, and including announcements or new laws, etc. If we really wanted to go in-depth with it, we could make it similar to notice boards in the Witcher III and have it generate small quests for the player to accept (such as fetch quests, maybe kill some pesky monkeys, rescue someone, etc.).

Love the idea of a hull fouling attribute, MK! It adds a sense of realism to the game, as wooden ships were notoriously high-maintenance if they wanted to keep up a good turn of speed – especially so in tropical waters, from my understanding. It adds a kind of ‘ship upkeep’ that you don’t have to pay, but will definitely want to if you’re going to maintain your ability to hunt down and capture prey – or escape from predators! Totally kosher idea!

Perhaps we should have ship repairs take actual time, and allow the player to go gallivanting around the town while the repairs/modifications are underway, as well as the option to simply skip directly to the end of the repair period by sleeping in the tavern (for which I would like to have the ability to simply rent the room for the duration of the repair period in a single go of things). This would be a cool feature, but would probably require more places to explore and things to do so as to keep the game interesting for the duration, and give incentive to not just buy a tavern room until the repair job is done.

Also, this last request of mine is one I desperately want to see implemented. I’m getting sick and tired of needing to point my 1st person ship cannon crosshairs at the sky just to try and hit something at long range – it takes my eyes off of the target, and the sea as well, increasing the risk of bad maneuvering. Can we reduce the angles here? I want to be able to fire at a target at long range while still keeping a reasonable field of view that lets me see my target while shooting at it.

[ians]

other ships always seem to know where i am,maybe news should only travel as fast as a ship can go from port to port.say of bountys.I can see all the other ships homeing in on my location from the main map as soon as i leave port.I have a english 2 nd rate fast battleship with upgraded point of sail (needed)Im being swarmed by ships that are like nats that I can blow out the water in a few hits.I think in real life no small ship is would mess with a ship of the line.unless it was a sneak attack in port if I had a small crew.in open sea small ships should not attack me when they have 20 4 pound cannons.I think a rumor/info option with npc could be usfull where info on ships can be paid and sold price depending on reputation,maybe news should only be availible when mail arrives on a special ship weekly lets say.a new licence for mail/news could be availible like the letter of trade for 30 days .player or npc could earn coins from this all other news not from this type of ship would be of lesser value.there could be trusted news from high reputation ships and not trusted news from low rep ships..all this could be placed in a place at the port.think I need a smaller ship,the damage to my sails alone could by a small pirate ship..

[Oldtimer]

Hi all,

I can not refrain from some remarks which I think apply generally to the game. If some will be in the coming update I apologize.
To make things clear, I am a diehard immersionist and realism nerd. Also a dedicated single small ship player(corsair difficulty) though I sometimes test larger ships. Anyway:

1. There is too much easy money in the game. Perhaps necessary if you run a squadron of your own. Solutions:

– a toggle for realistic storage in mod options. Meaning you have to pay wages to your commander and skeleton crew and pay for their food, rum and medicines too. Also pay a monthly storage fee.

– money comes from items. I play GoF largely because of the interesting items, but they are so easy to get that after a while you do not appreciate them anymore.
Would it be possible for the player to set probability to find item in the mod options like: 100% would be game default, then 75%, 50%, 25% and, drum roll please, 5%?
Having said that, there can not be too many items.

2. Too many events and encounters where the only option is fight to the death.
I`d like to be able to intimidate a enemy group and have them go. Or to bribe them, have them surrender or surrender to them myself. I think Vincent suggested possibility for player to be jailed. Maybe prosecuted even, with different outcomes based on player status in the game world?

It should also be easier to just run away from ongoing fight.

3. More factions, AoP 2 got it right with merchant faction, smuggler faction in addition to the other. Maybe a native faction? All should have own agendas and different opinion of the PC based on their interactions.

4. Immersion, like encountering fights between different patrols/shore parties. Join the fight or not? Meeting other playable chars at sea and on land with a shore party. Interaction based on personal/faction relation.

Re questlines, they should be doable without setting up your own fleet. Why not have governor assign named NPC commanders to to the Commodore, i e yourself? Or asking them for help directly.

5. The only idea I do not have is who will code this…

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Vincent]

Having news travel at a realistic pace would be cool (good idea, Ians!), and could lend another sense of time scale to the game. In addition, it probably would make sense for smaller ships to shy away from you when you have a much larger and more powerful ship – a sloop attacking a 2nd-rate lineship is pretty much suicide for the sloop, so why would an enemy captain do such a thing?

As Oldtimer says, most encounters require you to fight. I’d like to see more options when it comes to solving missions and quests, such as negotiating, bribing, fleeing, surrendering, etc., and I’d like any future quests added to have multiple ways in which you can accomplish the objective – that way, merchants with high negotiation skills can still complete a quest that may otherwise require high combat skills they don’t have, and so on. Some kind of law enforcement that will prosecute the player if they’re caught committing crimes would be an excellent idea, and puishments could range from a simple fine for the first time you’re caught stealing, to jail time for attacking a guard/citizen, and perhaps even execution or enslavement (both of which could be used to incorporate quests where you need to escape your pre-execution confinement/slavery). Encountering fights between between rival bandits, bandits and guards, smugglers and guards, guards and escaped slaves, etc. could also add flavor.

I think a good addition, especially if we add a law enforcement system, would be weapons that allow a player to deal non-lethal damage – rocks, saps, stinkpots, maybe clubs? That way, you can subdue a target rather than kill them, avoiding pesky murder charges while in town (and allowing you to capture escaped slaves/convicts for a bounty).

A native faction would be a great idea, and adds a lot of potential for new quests and missions, many of which could include moral choices (which are always great for roleplaying and ‘in-character’ playthroughs). Perhaps you’re working for a group of treasure hunters, but encounter a tribe of natives who are protecting the temple they want to loot because it’s a sacred burial ground for them – desecrate their sacred place and get rich, or turn on your employers to protect the temple’s sanctity? That sort of thing.

More smuggling quests would be great – it’s a part of the environment, after all, and plays an important economic role as well, so a prominent representation of it is something that can only add good things to the game, IMO.

[ians]

Yes Im thinking of a heat map idea,not only a yes or no/friend or foe relation ship with factions.lets say french have a bounty on me it should only apply in areas where i commit crimes etc then in other areas far away french ships wont know who I am..slowly this heat map would spread out/meaning the heat ive generated would spread out from the area I commited crimes.it could spread out as news travels over weeks then get lesser over time shrinking back to the location of the events that caused it in the 1st place..maybe a new map wich could be purchased could show this colored overlay.in the areas of high heat more ship encounters with those looking for me would happen..the heat map spreading would be at the same speed as what ships could travel at and would represent how fast news travels

[Vincent]

Just thought of it, but could we PLEASE have a way to sort the import/export lists in the trade window? It seems like they’re currently listed in the order you first visited them, and that can make finding the trade list you want very tedious. I’d like to be able to arrange them in ascending or descending order by name and faction, please. At the very least, please have the game arrange them by name in alphabetical order! That alone will make my life so much easier.

Also, could we get a trade goods catalog in the journal? I have two ideas for this, and perhaps we could even use both and give players the option to choose which one they want to use;

Option #1 – Minimalist/RPG: My first idea is to give players a journal entry that lists all of the towns in the game. When you select one, you get a page that tells you who owns that town and what island/mainland area it’s located on. Finally, you get a brief blurb that tells you a little about what is rare and what is plentiful in the town – but only SOME of the imports/exports/contraband are revealed in the blurb, and the rest have to be discovered when you visit the place. So, you may find from reading the blurb that the town often has to deal with medical problems, indicating that medicine is a probable import there – but it won’t tell you about some of the other imports, such as linen and gunpowder, for example. I imagine something kind of like the bio for an RPC character, in that it drops hints about things but doesn’t outright tell you, leaving it up to you to figure out what it all means. This is a great option for ‘in-character’ and more challenging playthroughs, not so much for those who don’t have the time or patience for this kind of thing.

Option #2 – Detailed: This is the ‘cheat sheet’ version – you get the same page as above, and each entry details the town’s faction, location, etc., but this time you get an explicit list of imports/exports/contraband that the town has. However, you do NOT get pricing information – you will have to visit a port to get final price info. This is a good choice for people who don’t have tons of time and/or patience, but not so good for those who want a challenging or ‘in-character’ experience.

Honestly, I’d like to see both options used, and a toggle that allows the player to switch between the two logs, and even turn it off completely if they want a really hardcore experience. What do you guys think? Really want to hear NK’s and Jeffrey’s thoughts on my ideas in this post, very curious to hear what they think of them.

[Oldtimer]

Hi all,

it is I, again:

– fighting is bungled by the original devs from the start. In confined spaces enemies spawn on you, there is no time to use any tactics except spawning health potions which does not help anyway because you are stunned by enemy hits. And changing position is very difficult because collision mesh locks you in one place.

Could it be doable to, say, have a look see from the outside, through a window or something into a potential fighting interior ground? Success chance determined by player stealth and luck. Succesful peek would make the fight easier by, say, lowering enemy proficiencies and/or health. A kind of surprise bonus.

– another thing: AoE weapons, blunderbuss type arms should hit several enemies at once. Also grenades should be in game. One weapon I lack is grenade gun or crossbow. The latter is a nifty contraption shooting a grenade with sharp protrusions so it sticks to most any material and explodes above ground lvl.

– forts, why must they be reduced by arty from the sea? Could they not be attacked from landside. Say, plant a mine, blow up a part of the masonry and charge in. Success chance determined by stealth and a new kind of officer ability: sapper.

Or poison the wells, not necessarily lethally. Stealth and a doctor with new poisoner ability needed.

Gender correct dialogues, playing female you will almost every time be addressed as a male, text or voice.

Happy New Year everyone, Oldtimer

[Oldtimer]

Hi all,

started playing 2.8.2 and will comment as my playthrough develops. Playing as Speirdyke, corsair diff., no autoload, reduced exp. gain by half. No buying of items except for basic nav enhancing thingies, medical supplies and bullets.

1. Is it possible to open ship interface for stored ships? By klicking on them in the log book, preferably. I find it difficult to decide which ships to keep/sell without being able to compare them directly.

2. Questline combat, fake challenge at its “best”. What is most annoying is that PC has no automatic weapon draw. So she/he is TWO clicks behind the very OP NPCs always spawning on top of the PC. One for drawing, one for dodging. Add good pistols to the NPC loadout and all fun is gone. Especially as PC is stun-locked.
Now after a few or rather not so few tries you may discover some tactics but I do not think it a good game design having to try and try again and again. A few tries, if any, should be enough.
This is especially annoying in interior spaces.

Non-questline combat, boarding and open locations is good, contrary to original COAS so it is possible to address problems I describe.

2.1 Solutions: auto draw for the PC, officers/shore party present, new weapons like stun grenades, stinkpots etc. Nerfing the enemies to realistic lvls. Intimidating the hostiles: “I am alone in here but there are men outside who will slice you up and feed homeless city cats with you if you dare touch me…” Success chance based on authority, leadership, success, luck. Total success: hostiles join you or let yourself mug them in exchange for safe passage. Implement some or all. Officers present perhaps as a toggle in mod options.

2.1.1 You survive the defeat to come back later but are penalized for a time. Just like surviving a sinking.

3. Ship performance. Some ships seem to me have a too low point of sail. Fore and aft rigged mainly. Should a light chebeck really have point of sail below 4?
Ships able to use sweeps should have very high point os sail but at a very low speed. For gameplay reasons no ships should be able to go straight against the wind.

4. More lvl 1 officers. I like to develop my staff from scratch. Officers lvl random, so lvl 1 officers present even if PC is high lvl.

5. Unlevel items. It seems to me that items you find are unleveled. Is that correct?
But items to buy are leveled though illogically. I see schiavonas appear from lvl 5 or maybe 6 while better weapons appear from lvl 1. Delevel everything for those who buy equipment. Also for found items if leveled contrary to what I think.

6. Officer loyalty. It would be good if officers had their nationality shown on their icon. And that it would influence their relation to PC.
Also that their rep. could change for some, any direction. They might see the error of their ways or degenerate to bloody assassins. Also some items may keep them in the crew even if they dislike the PC. Madeira cask, for one, should do that.

7. Peace out with a faction. Buy expensive indulgence from diplomats, governors or maybe even enemy commanders. Your relation will be set to neutral but with no letter of mark. For those who want to take the long road to national quests.

8. Money sinks. Have already remarked on storage costs. Would like to see much larger donations to churches, hospitals, asylums for a rep improvment. Yes, new municipal/religious buildings for PC to found/co-finance.

9. Ships armoury/weapons locker. As in Build mod, very good feature. Crew takes/puts back equipment for boardings/shore assaults. Would make all the weapons/potions you find/loot actually useful.

10. Hiring/mugging road bandits instead of killing them. Hiring peaceful walkers who want to sign up instead of always having to dismiss them.

11. Possibility to sign articles with your crew if you think the money comes too easy.

Enough ramblings for the moment, rgds,

Oldtimer

[Jeffrey]

#1 Might be a good idea. I’ve also been a little bugged not knowing the stored ship stats when I review the list, contemplating a sale or extraction back into the squad.

#2 Another thing I’ve noticed. I think the game should be consistent. Either never auto-draw during the sudden conflict eruption, or always. The inconsistency is a little irritating when you have to remember, “Oh yeah, when I confront the smugglers on shore during a mayor mission, I have to remember that this time I have to immediately manually draw after the initial conversation.” Probably another thing that can be changed at some point.

#3 That is an MK facet to respond.

#4 Could be done, but frankly I don’t consider that a priority and may not even implement since officers are typically desired to fill gaps the PC does not have, so I imagine most people have the opposite desire, for officers that are skilled.

#5 Some items are leveled, some are not, and some item appearances are based on whether they are very common, so they may be basic and low, but their basis of being very common makes them present often.

#6 I like this idea of over time, an officer might sway their original reputation. With my change to them being able to overlook some actions when their base reputation opposes the PC action, I might adjust to where if they do that enough times, their reputation will tick toward up/down, appropriately. I might consider this as it would be a quick adjustment to what already exists.

#7 Maybe…needs discussion

#8 Maybe. For now, seems like a lot of work to code, for a niche facet, so low priority.

#9 The weapons ‘cargo’ item on board, and Doctor skills, already takes care of this, and while not as intricate in the sense that there are no stats associated with discrete items and discrete one-on-one fight comparison scenarios per crew member, it saves processing time and code bloat, with faster, more general decision-making during the boarding. This is one area where I think the Build Mod got things wrong; their massive script code base and minutiae for every decision makes the game slow and error-prone. For boarding, I think I am satisfied with a more general boarding decision involving PC/NPC stats, and some small randomness; it’s faster.

#10 Maybe. There have been discussions about some dialog changes/additional actions that can be taken with other citizens/land encounters.

#11 Again, by virtue that you must ‘pay’ your crew and officers periodically, that’s close enough for now, as sort of ‘implied’ articles.

Some of these, while they might be ‘nice to have’, take time to code and since I appear to be the only one making both engine updates and script/mod updates, they go on an ever growing list and if I believe they take much time, will often fall to the bottom of the priority list in favor of more substantial updates due to personal time constraints since I have limited time to devote. Right now, I’ve been chasing the possibility of completely changing out the sea rendering.

[Oldtimer]

Jeffrey,

it is not like I demand anything. Just providing feedback. I am quite happy with yours reading my ramblings. It is the dev(s) who must prioritize their limited free time allocation.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[modernknight1]

Oldtimer,

I appreciate the input! Thanks. Some good recommendations here.

Agreed with number 1 and Jeffrey’s assessment

Agreed with number 2 and Jeffrey’s assessment. My recommendation is for auto draw every time. This has really never bothered me, but I have been playing this game forever, and I am adept with the sword in it. Its like instinctive for me to instantly react. One thing I would recommend if you are struggling with COAS fighting is to ensure your REACTION setting (available to adjust within the P.I.R.A.T.E.S. attributes selection at the very beginning of the game) is set to 9 or 10.

You are completely right on point of sail. I have been meaning to overhaul those numbers forever. Many of the numbers you see are simply left over entries from cut and paste when building the stats for a new imported ship. Not much thought has gone into this for a LONG time. I will get right on this one.

I am not in complete agreement on number 4 and Jeffrey and I discussed it at length. I agree that most players want the best officers possible. However, I do agree with a desire to take men from you crew ashore or an ability to recruit simple sailor types into your crew you can grant officer status as well. This is a good idea and I have jotted it down for the future. I plan to make and add some new more generic officer characters as a result.

Just as Jeffrey commented on items, I will add that many are time sensitive and will not appear until you are at a certain level. However, in many random treasures there is still a chance of finding very good items early on in the game. I think it is very important for me to emphasize that what you find at vendors, in treasure and on corpses is largely dependent on what difficulty setting you started the game at. If you start on a high level (I am playing on Admiral presently) your loot and the variety of available items is much more limited and rare items become even more rare. This is one reason I prefer higher difficulty settings because I hate getting loot too easily. You are guaranteed to get good loot and excellent items for sail WAY too early in the game if you are playing on the first two beginning settings. Some people really like this though. Not I said the cat….

Good points on 6. I do think that would be cool for nationality to influence loyalty or how much someone likes you and the ship he serves on. I also love the items idea. Actually I already had that idea a LONG time ago. One of the original motivations for items were that some could influence characters if you give them to them. I have slowly over time given more and more items special attribute and Jeffrey has helped me to get the items to go beyond that by modifying other numbers as well. we will continue to add attributes to many different items, although Jeffrey would have to tell us how hard it would be to make an item actually change loyalty from a hated – to a favorable status. I think this is doable given Isabella will change her mind about you when you give her certain types of jewelry. If Jeffrey decides to take this one on it may be a little while – as we have a very long and constantly growing priority list.

I guess I don’t understand number 7. You can already pay the diplomats to bring about neutral status with X faction.

Interesting idea on 8 – far in the future maybe. You realize you can give up to 5000 in donations to the Priest already. If you repeat this several times in a row, your REP does indeed improve with that faction. I see this almost as an exploit and have used it many times because you can get to HERO status again in a very short time by just continuing to give to the priest over and over again.

Agreed with Jeffrey on 9. Keep in mind that the weapons you purchase in cargo behave the same way that the weapons do in the Build mod weapons lockers. As a rule of thumb, keep double the number of weapons in your hold as you have crew members. If I have 100 crew I always keep AT LEAST 200 weapons and so on…

Speaking of weapons though, one thing the Build mod has that I would really like to get into our game, is a Weapons smith who can improve the stats on your weapons. I see this as a sort of transfer of code that the shipyard master works under to improve ship stats….

Interesting idea on 10. I never thought of hiring road bandits, however, I had discussed with Jeffrey the possibility of recruiting any character you see in the game into your crew. A dialogue for joining would come up and then a precentage of consideration YES, No, OR MAYBE – a monetary amount would be generated and a percentage of success for the offer. Most people would obviously refuse you – but every now and then…!

Signing Articles is an interesting notion, but is not really realistic in this game because most people changeover crews and ships so rapidly. It might be a neat option if you could get your crew to adept status – all three bars maxed. Then an option would come up – would you like to sign articles with you crew. If yes, you stop paying your crew. Every time you take a prize a percentage is auto deducted which is going to the crew for pay. However, the likelihood for crew mutiny goes WAY up if you don’t keep taking ships or treasures and instead start gallivanting off on the next leg of a quest without taking/avoiding ripe ships that are right there in favor of solving the next leg of a questline. In addition, if you change ships or many crew are killed off, the articles go void and you have to wait until those conditions are met once again. This would take crew management to a new level for a player who likes to stick with the same ship for a LONG time. I have done that before so I am sure others would find that option interesting as well. You would have to take care of your crew very well for it to pay off.

As Jeffrey said, new oceans and our new map/game world is our number one priority right now.

Thanks again for the input though…

MK

[Oldtimer]

Mr. Knight,

re 7: you peace out and get LoM with the relevant faction. Dialogue is explicitly abt. buying a LoM.

I would like a dialogue line: I want to make my peace with …….. . You get neutral relations and a right to fly their flag, but NO LoM.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Oldtimer]

Mr Knight,

– corsair diff, lvl 6, reaction 9. Medium sword with 77 min. dam, Austrian snubnose min. dam 75. Have not been able to defeat Tiepolos minions in interior even once in something like 30 tries. Came very close once. Had only basic defence melèe skill.
As a captain with heroic crew and officers ready to lay down their lives for me any moment I should not have to fight personally at all. If we take an realistic approach to life that is. A beloved, good leader does not necessarily have to be a fighter.

– so increasing difficulty to decrease “probability to find loot” would make me even more helpless in questline melèe. That is the reason for my suggestion to be able to set that probability in mod options as a coefficient across the board.
In some old games you could(can?) set different difficulties for different things. Like lieutenant for questline melèe, admiral for all else.

THX for the tip on weapon quantity. It really makes the weapons locker redundant.

Anyway, I think you have got your priorities right atm and doing questlines is not mandatory to enjoy the game.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Maltacus]

That sword’s the Chimaera, right Oldtimer? As beautiful and fun as it is overpowered…:)

I agree about bringing the shore party with you. I tried it out (modding it) with the keymasters house in Willemstaad and increasing the number of enemies to match – it was a grand battle for the stairs.

One other thing with quest fights and duel situations and such – you can not run back out. If you walk into an ambush a retreat should be a possibility but now you are magically sealed inside and the bodyguards outside.
Duels with enemy captains alone are a bit more plausible – pride, wishes to loot his important documents away from prying eyes, perhaps? They are also a handy way to get some fencing experience. Shouldn’t that be optional, like the option to spawn officers close to you when boarding or scattered? It’s a matter of orders more than anything else – “spread out and help our crew overall” or “focus into an elite group”/”come along and storm the cabin” or “wait outside and don’t disturb me”.

Right now reaction and the other fighting attributes are vital and the rest are optional but in a good role playing game they should all be of equal usefulness.

I would also very much like to see ship turning rate depend on the ships current speed. So if you are against the wind with a ship of the line you will not turn easily, and a small fast ship can have a chance of outflanking a large slow one if it has ripped the sails apart from a distance. Right now ships turn on the spot almost, independent of the wind. That destroys a lot of immersion for me. Please tell me what you think about this.

[Oldtimer]

Hi Maltacus,

I agree with you here. I already wrote that it should be easier to run from a fight, questline or not. And come back with your minions.

Generally there must be less suicidal NPCs. Lone bandits attacking a shore party, sloops dicing it out with forts? How realistic is that? It would also increase challenge if you had less opportunities to take much stronger ships than yours after they have been softened up by forts.

Generally: do not kill if you can persuade, if killing is unavoidable, have someone else do it for you. An ideal game in that style is Oblivion with the T.I.E. mod by Veritas Secreto. You should try it.

And it was the Chimaera, yes.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[modernknight1]

You’re braver than I am Old Timer,

I NEVER take on the Isabella quest until I am at least level 10 to 15 and have the curaiss armor, shootist, cleaver shot, and some of the sword fighting perks. Those guys at the Cathedral are bugger hard and I have been there. 30 times plus 30 times.

MK

[Oldtimer]

Mr. Knight,

if you have problems in spite of your skill and experience, it only proves that the game design is flawed and resorts to buffing up the enemies as the main way(easy for the devs) way to provide a “challenge”. I mean original devs as I suspect you have not touched these aspects of gameplay yet.

So why not have a toggle in “mod options” for officers/shore party always present for those who want realism. Masochists can stay away from that button. Everybody happy.

Keep up the good work,

Oldtimer

[Jeffrey]

I have long known some fights are near unwinnable, when playing on the higher difficulty levels as the original difficulty settings, when applied to the enemy generation, do not scale well, become super unbalanced, where the opposition far outranks you and often far exceeds your skill attributes.

One of the scenes I edited, due to that effect, was the Des Moines scene, where at difficult 5 and above, your fighters joined you by my manually placing them on the shore. However, based on my recent discovery, it was merely a bug in the model locators, so I retracted my code and simply fixed the locator group name that was erroneous, and now the fighters should appear as normal for that scene.

This discovery presented why your fighters never join you inside houses/rooms; it is not a script code setting that prevents them, it is the lack of ‘officers’ locators in the model; this was probably by design so that no setting need applied, it was simple to just not put the ‘officers’ locator group in the model and then your fighters were prevented from joining you, automatically, saving effort.

This brings me to the ‘toggle’ suggestion. Due to the fact that none of the houses/room models have this ‘officers’ locator group (the residence/mayor and tavern are the exceptions), it is not a trivial matter to merely add a toggle option for fighters to join/not join. Either every model would need modification to add the locators and group for the officers, or every house enter scene would need modification in the script to manually place them, like my old Des Moines fix. So we would have to scour the entire script code, find the scenes where fights might take place, and similar to my Des Moines old fix, manually place them inside.

To add, that Isabella scene, after the brother is killed, is one of the fights I have actually tweaked a little, due to its difficulty scale problems. It should be a little more even ramp up the difficulty scale. I slightly lowered the enemy rank calculation (it is based on your char’s rank, and they will still exceed yours, but not as much as COAS), I slightly lowered their skill points from the original, lowered their hit points, and I also added a little more time delay between your dialog with Tiepolo and when they enter, to give the player time to quickly run up the stairs so you can avoid the first, inevitable pistol shot (get slightly around the stair corner), and battle them one-on-one. Of course, you do have to just ‘know’ about this, and right after the dialog, quickly start running to the stairs.

At difficulty level 7, I can win about 3 out of 10 times, whereas I could never win at that difficulty before. So it may not be ‘ideal’ for some, but should be doable through difficulty 7, but you gotta run for the stairs at first opportunity and keep them single file for as long as possible, dispatching them quickly (use a nice, light weapon and a quick reload gun). Oh, and you really should beef up your defense/sword perks for the best chance.

• This reply was modified 6 years, 11 months ago by Jeffrey.

[Oldtimer]

Jeffrey,

you recommend a quick reload gun. That implies auto reload with sword drawn AFAIU. Am I correct?
I do not use that anyway being focused on realism.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Oldtimer]

Hi Jeffrey,

how abt. unlocking fight locations? So that PC can escape if too outclassed.
Is that as complicated as adding locators to all fight locations?

BTW, if/when doing new quests perhaps it would be not too much hassle to consider some of the suggestions made?

And if a smugglers questline is ever to be made, I think it should be two-pronged i e play smuggler or customs officer. The second alternative could be very interesting if PC had to fight both smugglers and corrupt officials within own administration.

Keep up the good work, Oldtimer

[ians]

Would like to have my own Colony,small navy,run my own island and economy..Choose my soilders uniforms…I want Jamaica all to myself “I say they do” Public hangings at my discretion and be able to go see the event,and be able to change my clothes have a nice wig like modyford etc..

[Vincent]

Would like to have my own Colony,small navy,run my own island and economy..Choose my soilders uniforms…I want Jamaica all to myself “I say they do” Public hangings at my discretion and be able to go see the event,and be able to change my clothes have a nice wig like modyford etc..

You can actually take a colony for yourself already – take a look through the COAS game manual included with the latest version of the game for more info. Imust say, though, that wanting to watch the hangings seems a tad morbid… LOL.

As for the small navy bit, you can run a squadron of ships (which IIRC is… eight ships is it?), though perhaps a new feature to add would be the ability to assign members of your squadron to patrol certain ports; you could even take it a step farhter and add the ability to order those ships to prioritize defending the port, raiding enemy commerce, or hunting down smugglers – that way I could assign a big warship to defend my newly captured town and assign another, smaller and faster ship to raid enemy convoys for supplies or to hunt down any smugglers who would dare to infiltrate my port.

Being able to change the uniforms on any guards you have would be an interesting but nice feature to have. An a wig of sorts could possibly be rigged up using the new headgear system the devs are talking about implementing in future releases.

On the whole, adding more options to play with after taking a town as your own would be a great addition (like managing tax rates, deciding what to make into contraband, managing the economy, and even adding new features/buildings/functionality to your city), and one that I’d well and truly enjoy playing around with on the whole; but I’m well aware that such an expansion to the ’empire management’ game mechanics will probably have to take a backseat to many of the more functional/critical game improvements already on the table.

[ians]

I would only order hangings for the pesky bounty hunters,It would add new meaning to them hanging around the docks waiting for me,maybe the stocks could be put outside for citizens entertainment…I remember Coas I think you had to do the main quest first before a city became yours…

[Jeffrey]

I remember Coas I think you had to do the main quest first before a city became yours…

Correct. One of the nation questlines need completed before you can retain a town and appoint one of your officers as caretaker/tax collector.

[ians]

It would be a good Idea if citizens offered info on who is looking for you such a bounty hunters..they shouldnt spawn near player as i leave my ship in port.I might be nice to see them in the distance as a group looking for you around the city,spawning enemy as it is is kind of okay for beaches/coves but not cities the soilders just watch them attack from 20 feet away and do nothing to defend such an upstanding member of thier city.

[modernknight1]

yeah the only time soldiers get involved is when they get hit by a stray bullet or sword slash. I have actually used that as strategy many times ensuring I am between the soldiers when bounty hunters or enemies are after me. As soon as the bounty hunters hit a soldier, they jump in on your side. Faction neutrality and REACTIONS FUNCTIONS are tricky things in this game. It took us forever just to get surrendering to work in a realistic way.

Love the input but a lot of these are pie in the sky right now. We do our best to STEADILY improve the game-play.

MK

[Jack]

First of all I just wanted to say that the 2.8 update is amazing so far, and thanks to everyone who made it happen!

However, it seems that 90% of the taverns I go to brush me off when I try to recruit more crew. Now I know that since there’s a boat load of new characters in this mod, there’s going to be a lot more captains out there who can get the crews or the jobs before you; but it seems to happen more often in 2.8. It gets rather difficult when I have to rely on recruiting other captains to take their crews.

Could you somehow reduce the rate at which this happens, or maybe half the pool of recruit-able crew members when another captain recruits them?

[ians]

I think It would be a good Idea If I could choose whats legal and whats not in the store,weapons cant be sold st martin store,Maybe an option with the shop keeper to change this can be put in,How does trade work in the game,Is what in the store random or is there a import export mech in the game?how detailed is it?anyhow its my island now and I want to sell opium to the pirate ships that dock in my port..what you decide to export could decide your relations with other nations in the game..Or maybe I could own a plantation and grow coffee etc..

• This reply was modified 6 years, 11 months ago by ians.
• This reply was modified 6 years, 11 months ago by ians.

[ians]

I think this is the most accurate game of this type with this mod,I am no programer so I do not no what is possible with this engine used…So here are some ideas..I would like to see if possible when I leave the dock and go to sea,same amount and type of ships from one scene to another,I dont know how detailed the trade is in this game but maybe it would be possible to cause trade item shortages in towns due to ones actions,then sell at an inflated price items at that town,more news,maybe a town paper,a court building where punishment for crimes can be dealt with,A bigger map if possible with more distance between the islands and land.I can see Trinidad from the coast of Barbados,news of late ships could lead to search missions for players or npc ships..

[Oldtimer]

Hi all,

it is I, again…

A small thing abt. dark nights and dungeons. Could we have an item: miners hat(hat with candle holder)? If you have that and candles, you can equip the hat in the armour slot and get some lighting. It should also give some limited armour protection.

Torches would require double wield I think and that seems not easy to implement if at all possible.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Oldtimer]

Dear devs,

would it be possible to change the cabin on state yachts to something luxurious as they are luxury VIP conveyances? There already are quite posh cabins in game that might perhaps be reused.

I fell in love with the one I took and sail around in it, but the cabin is very, very spartan.

Oh, and for fast “get away” ships they seem a tad slow.

Rgds, Oldtimer

• This reply was modified 6 years, 11 months ago by Oldtimer.

[modernknight1]

Hey Old Timer,

Actually one of our Russian members is looking at that and working on torches right now. BTW @ElGriffo (Rob) I found the files you wanted and will send you a link to download before the end of the day.

As far as the yachts are concerned you are totally right and I will make the appropriate changes. I am also very fond of them myself which is why I took the time I did making them different and skinning them. They were one of my earlier attempts and I could probably do a much better job now that I have become fairly good at reskinning ships. I have a list of ships and individual skins I am working to make better or that I was never fully happy with the results.

Some of these are going to be in the next update along with your desired changes for the yachts.

MK

[Oldtimer]

THX awfully Mr. Knight!

Oldtimer

[Orazio]

A more luxurious cabin for yachts you say? I may have the inspiration now! I’ll work on something.
The models you are referring to are Yacht1 and Yacht2 right? Are there any other yachtes?

[modernknight1]

I always love inspiration Orazio!

Yup those are the correct ones.

Can’t wait to see what you come up with!

MK

[Oldtimer]

@Orazio

Will your inspiration suffice for:

– sleeping cabin,

– dining room,

– lavatory?

I sure hope it will.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Oldtimer]

@ Orazio

And library/smoking room, that might give some uses to madeira casks and tobacco.

BTW would functional pipes be possible? There is gunsmoke so…
I think cigars were also in use at that time.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Orazio]

Slow down, Oldtimer 😀
I’m just creating one single cabin for yachts (though maybe it can be assigned to other small/medium ships as well, I’ll see).
I’m not going to model the interior of an entire ship.

I’m not sure about functional pipes, they probably require a custom animation so you can see your character smoke them. Anyway, it’s not a priority right now.

[Oldtimer]

OK, I will put my creativity dept. in loitering mode.

I do not suggest several cabins, btw. But there already are cabins with several interconnected compartments, like sleeping, dining, lavatory.
Reworking them is what I was thinking about.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Maltacus]

I have been thinking a bit about the tavern drunkards and a quest originating from them:
Flying Dutchman quest: I haven’t tried it out ingame but according to a walkthrough I read the quest begins like this in short:
1. Talk to some drunkards about the dutchman.
2. The ship appears as an easily recognizable pirate fleet (extra big ship) and can be engaged from the map the usual way.
3. The dutchman is unboardable so you sink her or get sunk (the latter is supposed to happen). If you sink her she can be summoned

again the same way.
4. You have to get sunk by the ship to progress in the quest, and only after that can you start with the measures required to make

the ship “un-cursed” and boardable.
So, the point is to investigate the ship and conclude that it is cursed and the crew not the usual troublemakers you run into. Why

does your ship have to get sunk because of it? That makes no sense. Shouldn’t it be enough to get close to the ship to conduct the

paranormal activity investigation? And another thing is that the player does not know that he/she is supposed to be sunk to

progress, so obviously in a blind playthrough the player will retreat before being sunk, or reload and post a bug report when the

ship is unboardable.
IF the player necessarily has to lose the ship (easily worked around by storing the flagship and buying a small new one) and the

officers with it (very boring role-playing-wise but game-wise a minor setback), shouldn’t there be some note in the logbook about it

so you understand it? A prophecy that the ship can only be defeated by being sunk by it, “it’s victims shall be its bane” or

whatever?
Tavern drunkards and being robbed when drinking too much: If you buy them a drink to listen to rumors (such as about the dutchman

above) or start a brawl there is a chance that a scripted event occurs where the character loses all or a big part of the money

carried. The explanation is that the character
1. fell asleep from too much rum – very believable!
2. …a band of armed robbers later entered the tavern brandishing weapons – hmm, seems a risky target…
3. …the robbers managed to rob the character and presumably everyone else and dissapeared without a trace. Now, they are supposed

to have pulled that off among a bunch of well armed patrons, a firm bartender threatening to call the guards at the mere noton of

raised voices, up to SIX BODYGUARD OFFICERS and in a city that is bristling with soldiers, who are also ready to patrol the jungle

to catch a single escaped slave. This does not make sense!
Now, is this such a challenge that it is worth having despite the lack of logic? Hardly. You can easily work around the risk by

giving the gold to an accompanying officer and take a little over a hundred for rum. It only creates the hassle of waiting for the

waitress to have her announcement when you wake up and having to withdraw some more gold to continue rum drinking.
So, this robbery event is in my opinion something that should be dropped. It does not add a notable challenge, it is a hassle that

is not fun, and it does not add immersion – it detracts from it.

[Jeffrey]

OK, I’ll tell you the real story that happens in the tavern…

You passed out from too much booze…a lightweight who can’t handle your liquor while trying to scam gossip from the hardcore barflies.

While you were passed out, the waitress and other patrons, laughed a little, then conspired to take your money, then lie about it, telling you a tall tale of robbers bursting in; your head hurting is just residual wooziness and the beginnings of a hangover. You, apparently are quite gullible and you believed her. When you left the tavern, they all laughed at your naivete that their scam worked.

OK, I just made that up, but since you bought her story, it is indeed plausible, so I think it might be true, LOL

As for the Dutchman, I agree, that there should be more of a hint about what to do, and since I am reluctant to change it because getting sunk introduces a fun little ‘easter egg’ if you do it more than once, I think I might just add a bit in the log, where the initial tales you hear from the drunkards are about it being ‘unboardable’ then if you do go out, chase it, somehow escape the battle without being sunk yourself, after the second time of running away, add another log entry where you ‘are thinking’ maybe you need to just commit, and stay in the battle to the long, bitter end, to somehow eliminate this scourge, consequences and Davy Jones’ Locker be damned; some sort of clue that you need to stick it out in the battle.

What do you think? Feel free to disagree or argue further, MK might chime in with his thoughts as well.

[Maltacus]

With all due respect for hardcore roleplaying gamesmanship etc, you seem to be confusing me and the player character. First, may I remind you that I wrote “The explanation is that the character…” and that “This does not make sense”. That is usually not a sign of someone believing much of something. And however the character is robbed the issue with the officers (potentially devoted) still remain by the way – why would they not react? Are you telling me that you find a smooth theft (by armed robbers or lying patrons or whoever else) in that company plausible?
I’m dissapointed in you. Feel free to disagree about my suggestion or arguments but do that in a civil way. There is little point in posting suggestions if people just make fun of you for it.
Second, as I wrote I’m all for keeping things as they are provided some sort of guidelines like perhaps what you describe is added, so a player interested in the quest actually has a fair chance of completing it with the information provided in the game. I would vote for some clue that you actually must let your ship be sunk (payment to Davy Jones maybe, a ship for a ship or something) to be able to defeat the dutchman permanently.

[Jeffrey]

I’m sorry you got offended…my story for your character was supposed to be a joke about how your character was tricked by the waitress and other drinkers, and that the character was gullible enough to believe their story about the ‘robbers’ when there weren’t any and the waitress was just using that robber story to hide the fact she and the other patrons robbed you instead. And I just made up that whole story as the only plausible way it could happen because I agree with you that robbers storming in, with all the outside guards around, is very unlikely.

I did not mean for you to take this as some sort of insult to you, it was just supposed to be a funny story to make what happened to the character in the game, almost believable.

[Maltacus]

OK. The thing is I thought you were done talking about the main character and talking about me instead, here:
“OK, I just made that up, but since you bought her story, it is indeed plausible, so I think it might be true, LOL”

[Jeffrey]

No, that was indeed the entire joke in that statement: You the person, did not find the robber story believable, but ‘you’ the character did, so that’s why I think my story that I made up was true…your character bought the waitress’ claim as truth, so that’s why I thought everything I said might actually be true, about the character’s inability to figure out the ‘real’ story — that one I made up. That’s why I thought it was funny.

I was just looking for maybe some possibility for keeping that part in the game, with a somewhat weak reasoning, with my crazy, possible story for ‘why’ or ‘how’ it ‘really happened, as a possible reason.

But, then you also brought up a good point that if your officers are standing there, watching the conversation, for why even my ridiculous story might not happen either.

I still thought my storytelling was humorous, but I really did not mean any of the claims were aimed at you, personally; it was all aimed at your character as an imagined scenario.

[Vincent]

I think it was just a joke, Maltacus, no need to get all edgy about it. But I do agree with you that the situation needs some tweaks for those of us who like to roleplay – my loyal officers are not going to sit by and let me get robbed (at least I hope so…). I think a good compromise may be to make it so that you never get robbed (or have a significantly reduced chance of it) when you have one or more officers with you. Perhaps a certain reduction per officer that stacks?

I also agree that the Dutchman quest should have some kind of clue telling the player that they have to be sunk in order to progress the questline, though I think it should be something that forces the player to think about what the hint means and figure it out for themselves.

[Jolie Rouge]

A thought that just hit me: would it be possible to buy into a shipyard, so you could order a ship?
Depending on colony economy and goods available, maybe you’d have to deliver some of the materials needed; logbook entries about the building progress and when it’s finished it could be the topmost ship in the list of what you can get from that shipyard. And being a co-owner would make it somewhat cheaper.

Also, copper and iron ore could be delivered to certain towns for further processing, generating high value goods like copper plating or whatever.

[ians]

I would like to see if possible to decide what is contraband in my own colony,mabye a way to interface via a colony menu where the ruler {myself} could apply the changes.maybe a diplomacy screen that tells my colony realation with other ports etc..also set up my own justice level,how strict a ruler is could result in what type of ships,characters,trade one gets,I would like to see trade sytem in place where if I withhold exports of a certain type it could lead to shortages in other islands,that could be exploited later once prices have gone through the roof,or it could lead to an attack on my port..It could open up another avenue for eras..although I fully understand that eras is not strategy game,it could give players a chance to run things when not at sea..(P.S.) Modyford chair is empty but I cant sit down in it,standing up all the time is for those that serve me in Port Royal…

[Christoph]

I would like to reduce the effect of “grape shot”. I feel it quite unrealistic, that you can shoot done the crew close to 0 with grape shot. It should be more like, as long as the ship has a lot of crew, the effect should be higher, but then go done. Also it should stop at a certain point. That would make bigger ships even harder to board.

[Oldtimer]

Hi all,

please make all quests refusable. You can refuse Blue Bird quest, why not other non-national quests too?

Rgds, Oldtimer

[modernknight1]

OK a couple comments to let you all know that we take all of your input seriously.

Christoph’s question on grapeshot is very well founded – as a former Army analyst and someone who used to play with simulated damages solutions, he is absolutely correct. So I asked Jeffrey if we could make it more difficult to eradicate the last 10 percent of crews with grape. They would be hiding behind the gun wales and anything else when the enemy fires. Jeffrey has done it again. This is done!

So based on Oldtimer’s comments asking why certain ships are not available – we are expanding my new cannon mod to also add ships.

So now you will not only have many new types of cannon available (including both iron and bronze [bronze 10 times more expensive but rarely fail] – AND these types of guns will only be available at certain ports – e.g. large guns will only be found (in limited numbers) in large cities like Curacao, Port Royal, Havana – etc… but also the sizes (caliber if you will although an inaccurate term) will also be based on nationality – i.e. 11 pounders and 50 pounders will only be found in Spanish ports, 36 pounders only in Curacao, 32 pounder (iron only) will only be found in Barbados and Port Royal, etc etc… Jeffrey and I are even talking about new quests/missions where you are tasked with illegally running (smuggling) guns. Something I have wanted to do for a long time.

Anyway in this same mod update, we are also going to implement what ships are available at what ports. This will be REALLY important when we get the new map and colonies are finished. There will be many ports where the only sized ships you will ever be able to get will be class 6 and 7 with maybe an occasional class 5. Only big cites will have big ships available. Occasionally large ships will show up at pirate ports as well – sold off prizes you know. This will be an awesome new mod!!! I can hardly wait to finish it myself.

Joulie Rouge’s idea of “Buying a shipyard”. We have discussed this and it is possible, however I will reveal now that for some time Jeffrey and I have been discussing opening up new stores/warehouses which you can rent (like in POTEHO) or even buy yourself and then store as much cargo of whatever types you want. You notice there are certain buildings in town which have no locator icons to enter – well these places will be enterable soon and this will become more important when the new map is complete because some of the new large towns will have two or three different competing supply stores.

If the town is raided (just like with you deposits in banks) you stand to lose a certain amount of stores in your warehouse.

Last – another idea Jeffrey and I have been playing with is to bury treasure. So imaging coming to a secluded beach – going to the rocks next to the cliffs in an out of the way place and pressing your new SHOVEL icon to bury treasure. You will only see this icon if you have an empty chest item added to your inventory. Once the chest is placed you can fill it with whatever you want and it will stay there. However, its buried so you will not see it – just the open chest icon when you near the spot.

You will be responsible for making your own treasure map so that you will remember the location of your new cache.

That’s all for now.

MK

[Stefano Zanderighi]

I’m really looking forward to all those changes, the one to grape shots over the others. I always feel like cheating reducing the crew of the other ship to zero… beside this I think that even without crew the ships were going fast and firing cannons.
If you succedeed in reducing the effect of the grapeshots is possible to increase the effect of a really depleted crew?
Really looking forward to another public release if there will be one.

[Vincent]

Been forever since I looked on here, and my planned ‘first look/unboxing’ video fell through – and being so busy with life, I haven’t had a chance to upload (or even film) any new videos. That, and I’m eagerly waiting for the release of the HBS BATTLETECH game this coming April – I finally get to play it after helping to kickstart it a few years ago, so I may be out of touch with pirates for a while as I sate my ‘big stompy robot’ fetish, LOL.

Did want to mention, though, that I like the new additions coming!

MK, I like the idea of burying your treasure, though I’d like to see a way to put marks and writing on our maps in-game if we do that – and perhaps we can use the idea in a different way. Is it possible that we could use similar mechanics in future to add buried treasures you can discover? I remember playing Assassin’s Creed 4, and it was always fun to decipher the treasure maps in that game and find a reward of some kind in return for the effort, and something like that would be a cool addition if we can bury treasure as well.

I feel like I should point this out again, and I will continue to do so until this is addressed – but when aiming your ship’s cannons using first-person view, you have to look upwards to aim out at long range. That’s fine, but the issue is that currently you have to look up at the sky top get to maximum range, and that bugs the hell outta me. Can we fix it so that you don’t have to look up so far to aim your guns at longer ranges?

[Oldtimer]

Hi all,

started playing as Speirdyke, one of my all-time fav chars and noticed that his starting rank is now 4. I must say I do not like this change. I`d much prefer starting at lvl 1.

Now some playable chars start with ships way above their capabilities. Not really immersive and a bit unfair to people who in RL were competent enough to run a three-decker. Why not give them items/officers that decrease the penalties? Or give them weaker ships, not many commanders started career with a 1-st rate.
Say max penalty -2 thanks to items/officers, irrespectively of ship?

Another fav peeve is leveled items/ships and whatnot. It`s not logical that items worse than those showing up from day one appear later in game. Especially as some are really good looking but must be skipped as already inefficient. Yeah, I know I repeat myself.
How hard/time consuming would deleveling be? In the TES series it`s quite simple IIRC.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Christoph]

This is really cool stuff you are working on. And even better to see, that you take the input serious, this is motivating.

Let me comment on the topic “grapeshot”. I would even go higher 20-40 percent and after that, damage to crew can only be done by explosives and standard balls.

Another thought I have already for sometime is “making friends”, but I can imagine this might be hard to achieve. If you help people, a merchant, a woman in the jungle, a trader on the open sea, it would feel nice, if at least sometimes you can have them as friends, supporters with special abilities. Also these people could be the start for other mini quests. Something like a demand for help in a certain issue…
Again, I guess this might be difficult to achieve, just dreaming a bit.

[DarkSlimus]

Ahoy Buccaneers,

A lot of good suggestions in this topic. Let me add my one. During my games I loot; I loot, I loot … I sold I sold I sold … but i’m always frustrated by one thing. I have a lot of chests to store weapons, books, ammunitions, etc. But I want a place to store my loot. Powder, woof, planks, etc …

Is it possible to add an option in the store dialog to rent space for keep some loot for the rainy days ? Like we can do for money, with the same risk if the city is looted by enemies ?

[DarkSlimus]

I Reply to myself cause I can’t edit … :

hey you in my head, the idea as already be validated ! are you blind or drunk ?

and I add my Edit in the same time :
Another thing I want to see is the possibility to use more than three buttons on our modern mouse.So we can block with mouse button 4 for example, or change view and use spyglass quickly during battle …

[Oldtimer]

DISCARD ITEMS

Hi all,

quite often you get items you do not want to keep, even for selling. A discard/throw away function would be nice. Like click RMB on item while in inventory and get question: Do you want to discard this item permanently? If yes it`s gone, forever…

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Schiavonna]

Dugout Canoes with 20-30 man capacity, bought as 1 ship but with 5-6 models displayed when in 3D world. So then its possible for a player to board and take ships with 100-150 men from the harbour or nearby the shore.

Are you up to the challenge Jeffrey and Orazio? (Maybe a little too ambitious? (Cue Orazio fainting at the propect of modelling another ‘boat’!)

Oh, and regarding the Special Historical Battle scenarios: Spierdyke versus Pardal. Make it extremely hard for Spierdyke to win (he was at an extreme disadvantage historically), so it becomes the “kobayashi Maru” of pirate game scenarios. An extremely challenging, almost ‘No-win’ scenario for the hardened AoP2 bilge-rat to sink his teeth into.

[GHOSTMD]

Well i might give in some wishes too 😉 if i am allowed.
If some of them are already stated, i am sorry.

As said before i am kind of a sucker for a more fantasy like setting,
doesn t mean i don t enjoy your work though… so some of my wishes reach
back to GoF2.1.5 so if i tangent a touchy subject i am sorry. (looking at the
history of the mod since back then, i mean)

1. What happend to the ship viewer in game? If i recall right there was something
like this planned aye?

2. Manual setting of the Nation relationships at the start of the game, so you can have
the war / peace scenario you want to start with, instead of the randomized one

3. Option to choose between Fantasy / Historical / inbetween gamesetting. where you set
the NPCs and Officers you can meet.
– fantasy = Flint, Long Jon, Devlins, maybe some old “friends” from 2.1.5 like Sparrow, Norrington, Barbossa, Turner and so on
– historical = spragge, de ruyter and all the awesome NPC / PC they are there
– inbetween = a complete set of ALL characters fantasy and historical

4. a personal Jolly Roger? Maybe with the option to put in your own flags?
5. actual Option at the warf to choose the skin of the ship? When taking in upgrades
for example
6. a actual questline around those cursed coin? maybe? (if bringing back PotC chars is a option)

i suppose that is enough for now XD, had also the wish to actual bring back the
“make Settlement” option from AoP 1 but i think that is quite a bit of hard work :/

[Stefano Zanderighi]

Just a little post to say that I’m relly amazed by the improvemts in sea battles with the last few versions. Enemy ships are actually more dangerous and manovring a lot more. Really loving the improvements to cannon range and damage.

[Vincent]

GHOSTMD, I think anything from Pirates of the Caribbean would be off-limits for the game itself, since the devs are going to be selling it for profit. That means that they would very likely need to acquire a license from Disney of they wanted to include those characters, something that would be horribly expensive and probably not really worth it. A fan created mod, made available for free, could add them in, but the main game being made by MK1 will likely never include them.

Wanted to comment here about a few wants, now that I have a minute. Firstly, I shall say that one or two of GHOSTMD’s ideas are appealing to me. I have mentioned before about adding a feature that would allow us to select which skin we want at a shipyard, and I came up with a bit of an idea for it; Whenever you purchase a ship, it comes in a random color scheme, and then you can pay the shipyard to repaint it. This would rewuire one of two things; a catalog of images showing the paint scheme for every ship, or some kind of ‘ship viewer’ that lets you look at the ship models themselves.

The ability to select a personal Jolly Roger would be really cool as well, and the ability to ‘upload’ a flag of your own creation would be insanely cool.

Personally, I would like to ask for you guys to add the HMS Interceptor to the game, since it’s probably my favorite ship from the PotC series. It isn’t exactly period appropriate, since the vessel the movie used is a replica of a late-18th century ship, but despite that I kinda don’t think it would look too terribly out of place in our own late 17th-century game.

Finally, one last request; Tortuga is one of my favorite ports to operate from, and I found a picture of a market street that I thought would make a cool inspiration of you guys ever decide to rebuild the Tortuga city area, and I would love to see a mainstreet market near the docks based on this scene. Here’s a look at it;

[modernknight1]

Anyone who has read the READ ME file for ERAS or understands what I’ve always been attempting to achieve with this endeavor would never even ask about bringing in anything from the Disney fantasy BS into our world. Take that shit over to the Pippi Longstockings universe and enjoy yourselves.

The interceptor is already in the game, she is just named something different. She is simply just the Lady Washington moored up at Gray’s Harbor Washington state USA actually. I’ve been aboard her and sailed on her FOR REAL on numerous occasions! She also makes an appearance as the Enterprise in one of the Star Trek movies (Generations I think?).

I Like the Tortuga picture. Have you seen the harbors/towns in POTBS or AC Black Flag? That’s what I would like to eventually achieve with our game. We have some excellent new locations almost ready for inclusion and we have a large repository of already made buildings now as well. So anything is possible, but there are just so few of us working on this that I can’t promise anything – especially within any kind of realistic timeline. I wish I could attract a location modeler to the team, but so few are actually interested in what we are doing. I have been really busy and preoccupied with other things lately, but I also must admit that I’m just coming out of a massive burnout because of that fact that so few are interested in helping with our world/work. I have always said that I do this for myself more than any other reason. That continues to be true and is a primary reason why I don’t think I will ever stop doing this even if I do occasionally burn out – and even if years from now when everyone has long forgotten about it – I will still be tinkering around with it in my back room. I played a bunch today – and Jeffrey’s changes continue to make things so much better. Loving the new AI!

MK

[modernknight1]

Oh and BTW, Jeffrey has already stated that it is very possible to select your own flag and to have that an option in the game. As with many other things, he is waiting on me to provide the content so that he can make it a reality. I know I must frustrate him. I simply need to come up with a new texture sheet of privately available pirate colors to select and he can implement it. SO this has been discussed – its my fault it hasn’t happened yet. Sorry.

MK

[Vincent]

Thanks for the reply, MK, I was a bit worried after not hearing from you for so long. I really do hope you’re feeling better, since I’m very much looking forward to any new updates you plan to release. I’ve also been recording my latest playthrough, but I haven’t had a chance to upload any of the videos yet, unfortunately. I’m so jealous of you for getting to sail on the Lady Washington, though, as she’s one of my favorite modern replica ships – that’s why I asked if we could have a version of the Interceptor, it’s like having a decently armed Lady Washington!

I’ve also seen the towns in both games you mentioned, as I have actually played both games and really enjoyed them (to different degrees…), so I can understand what you’re going for, and I think it’s an awesome goal!

Since you mentioned participation, I will tell you that my cousin has agreed to try and help me add some quests to the game since he’s better with code then I am, though we’re both relative noobs at this kind of thing so I can’t make any solid promises – but we’re going to try anyways. I also have a new soundtrack that I’ll try to upload in the next week for you to review, since I personally feel rather satisfied with it after a lot of tinkering.

What exactly is involved in modeling locations for GOF? I don’t really have much of a head for coding work, but I’d certainly be willing to at least try my hand at modeling some locations for you if you’d like me to. After all, nothing ventured, nothing gained, am I right? What I need to know first is what kind of software I would need to have, and what would the process involve? Would it be something relatively simple like moving objects around in an editor, or more like writing code? Once I know all of that I’ll see if I can help out in that regard. Hopefully, I can contribute something.

[Vincent]

Wanted to ask, since I’m curious, but would it be possible to add restrictions on ship availability according to year – such as keeping them unavailable until a certain year and then having them dissapear in a certain year? After all, our game covers a relatively large time period during which ships were constantly evolving in one way or another, and older designs were being replaced with newer ones. As an example of this, we could put limitations on different ships so that we only see vessels appropriate for the 1700s when playing Blackbeard, such as French Indiamen and Bristol Merchantmen, but not caravels or carracks, and we won’t see brigs or levantine ketches when playing buccaneers like Tavish Greaves and Captain Blood. Could be a good optional feature for those of us whop desire even more period-appropriate ship selections.

[GHOSTMD]

Ahhh no worries MK ^^,

since the topic here is “features and changes i d like to see” i just took the
freedom to express mine. I am just a sucker for a more like fantasy set instead
of trying to go for realistic. Since Flint is there i just thought it would be
a good idea to give the guys the option on game start to set fantasy / historical
“flag”.

You re right though that Disney gave some BS with the PotC Movies, yet i admit i quite
enjoyed them specially the first one. So i was kinda pleased with GoF 2.1.5 s char set
you know. Besides as long as we still have to option to make some mod changes to the
ERAS this should be fine, aye?

Hm good to know the personal flag option is already in development, thx for that piece
of information 😉

So long
GHOSTMD

[Oldtimer]

Hi all,

dear devs, let`s face it, take a break from new features. Improve on what is already being worked on or is already in game but inactive.
As an immersionist I `m very much concerned with consistency and logics. If I repeat myself here I apologize in advance. Righty:

1. Enable choices already present in dialogues, like passers-by wishing to sign on actually joining the outfit. Same for city bums. Enable tavern brawls where appropriate dialogue also is present. Perhaps the tavern dialogue could be extended to make real duel challenges possible.

1.1 If insulted, make it possible to intimidate for a money/item indemnity. Success chance depends on charisma/rep. Or challenge the culprit to a duel where he might hire a master fighter as stand in.

2. Make “pirates proposition” quests logical. A commissioned officer or LoM holder should not propose attacking his own faction or a faction his country is neutral or allied with. Less proposals? Well, it would be a good thing… Pirates should not be present in national taverns(unless they have extreme stealth maybe). If they get caught, let`s have a nice cut-scene with their execution. Same for pirates you turn in to the authorities.

3. Make all the dialogues gender-aware.

4. Give back the shrunken head to Lionel Wafer in starting inventory! He(I) likes to fondle it now and then…

I think this is labour intensive enough so I`ll save my other ideas for now. This game is improving in leaps and bounds as is but can of course be made even better.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Oldtimer]

Hi all,

checked out for more inconsistencies re relations as per 2. above and:

– what is de Huidobro doing in an english tavern while Spain is at war with England? Checked with F10 and he was in spanish service.

– how come that Mlle. Delahaye is bound for Santiago while a pirate? Also checked with F10.

Merchants/passengers from hostile nations are frequently seeking assistance in taverns. Only explanation would be that they have permits for trade with enemies. Yes, that was possible back then. But there are no functional trade licenses or permits in game as yet. Hostile passengers might be very rarely met rationalizing they have very high stealth but that`s all.

Dear devs, IMO eliminating inconsistencies should be priority no 1.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Jeffrey]

I will address one at a time. First is this, since it seems the simplest:

2. Make “pirates proposition” quests logical. A commissioned officer or LoM holder should not propose attacking his own faction or a faction his country is neutral or allied with. Less proposals? Well, it would be a good thing… Pirates should not be present in national taverns(unless they have extreme stealth maybe). If they get caught, let`s have a nice cut-scene with their execution. Same for pirates you turn in to the authorities.

That is a side-effect of the original game, combined with our many NPC heroes. The original game only had 3, with no real national loyalty, so they could be anywhere and after anyone’s loot. Since we added so many historical characters, now they sometimes propose at odds with their real persona. We can add an attribute to them so they don’t go wayward like you describe. I will get a list from MK and we can make that happen.

I already added code to keep them appearing in their “friendly” ports, but Pirates can still go anywhere; we presume they are crafty and stealthy, but the game takes no measure upon port entry for them. So they are always 100% guaranteed to appear wherever they wish to go.

[Oldtimer]

Mr. Jeffrey,

THX for your attn.

Abt. pirates being able to go anywhere because of assumed very high stealth, is that too difficult to change to realistic lvl?
Meaning that yes, sometimes he can risk it and go anywhere but can be caught.
A task for player could be turning in the bstd to the authorities if he can disclose his true identity. After a fight perhaps? In the tavern? Also the pirate could be killed in such a case and be permanently removed from the game world.

IMO giving them pirates free entry to wherever damages immersion.

Rgds, Oldtimer

• This reply was modified 6 years, 5 months ago by Oldtimer.

[Oldtimer]

Leveling

As you know I`m all for unleveled game worlds. I have now played with leveled and unleveled items and my conclusion is, as you might have guessed, that there are pros and cons for both approaches.

1. Leveled would be OK with some releveling of pistols. I would have blunderbuss, Cookson snubnose and Alsatian pistolette available at vendors from lvl 1. Swords are generally OK. Maybe schiavona should be available from lvl 1 but with a tenfold increase in price, it`s a very good sword.

2. Unleveled would be OK if chance to find/loot an individual weapon outside of settlements(or steal there) would be very much reduced.

3. Ships, all class 7 and 6 ships should be possible to find from lvl 1, but not at every shipyard. Bermuda sloop only at Bermuda wharf, say. Hoy should be releveled to class 7. It`s the best looking model in game but woefully weak for class 6.

Myself I actually lean more towards alt. 1.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Raul]

Personally in the latest download I find it impossible to earn any money at all by being a pirate.

What gives the most money is taking items from the dead bodies, in which you can find even items that give 200k. However now even trying to steal gold gives very little money, mainly because the quantity is reduced by a lot (specially seeing that it needs 8 units of cargo per gold).

Basically I am now a pirate hunter rather than a pirate, much more profit I must say.

P.D: I think this happens because even if I deactivate GOF weight and prices it doesn’t affect the game at all. Even if I have that mod option activated or deactivated the weight of gold is 8 cargo units.

It’s a shame too that the mod doesn’t save my configuration.

• This reply was modified 6 years, 5 months ago by Raul.

[Oldtimer]

DUEL CHALLENGES, FRIEND DOWN THE WELL

Hi all,

not sure it is a good idea to post suggestions before the new site is operational but anyway:

– if there are no inactivated duel mechanics in code already perhaps the elite assassin mechanics could be used. You are challenged by him to a meeting at a set time and in a set place. Perhaps this could be reworked so that PC can challenge others and accept challenges issued by others.

– if you accept to help the girl worried abt. her brave friend going down a well you can either meet this heroine in the cave alone OR some fairly skilled robbers. The second case is a setup to murder and rob you and the worried girl is an accomplice.
Could it be made so that you could meet the accomplice later in other circumstances and by different threats make her pay with valuables, info or services of a more intimate nature whenever requested to… If she refuses you may try to turn her in to the authorities. If she accepts you may face new attempts on your life while collecting your due.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Filipe]

What about making missions cheaper? Like adding a chance to infiltrate the pearl village as we do in enemy towns, it would be more on par with the rest of the game, so to speak a 50% chance to get in there with lvl 100 in Sneak or 33%, but make it possible to do that as we need more or less 3 to 4 licenses to do the missions on that location and that basically kills the profit.

Also to replace the % of the wealth cost in missions like the “kill the beggars” where that locksmith by a god sent message to knew our wealth, so instead of putting our money on the moneylender we should add the commerce skill in the equation to make sense so the higher the skill the better the price even though the locksmith doesnt seem to negotiate I think its better than the hassle to store the money to not get “robbed” as we now with ship repainting have more options to spend that money on to.

[ians]

Well ive Done the English quest line, Port Royal is mine again.I have noticed that once every 4-5 weeks the English try to take is back..2 times so far..even after becoming neutral again and paying money.. How many times will they try to take it back?

[Maltacus]

@modernknight1
The cannon mod that you have mentioned, how complete is that work? Do you have any material that could be useful to share even though the whole work is not ready, like guidelines, source material, spreadsheet/tables?
.
Many ships appear to be very heavily armed and crewed, both compared to sources about ships of somewhat similar size and compared to other ships in the game. By the latter I am referring to for instance when a slim and flimsy xebec carry the same size of guns as small frigate of much sturdier construction. Not to mention the ludicrous bluebird with the scripted 24-pounder guns…
.
I intend to modify the stats for my own convenience but if anyone has started with something like that or has input I welcome it.

[ians]

It might be a good idea if,that when I attack a nations ship in the middle of the sea with no witnesses,that the nation it belongs to does not find out straight away..This mechanism could be linked to other factors like player stealth.High stealth =less chance of sunk ships nation finding out..(Suspect) status could be implemented as well as neutral,bounty etc..At the tavern player could pay for rumors in the questions with the barman,thus could be told by the barman that he is a suspect in the sinking of ships of a certain nation,barman could be paid to spread false rumors that player is inocent or it could be done via the same character that player pays to reset their relations.Having not sunk a ship and robbing it for example,then the nation status normal,bounty etc should allow a few days before it takes effect.For immersion this would repesent the ship you attacked taking time to sail back to port..It would be nice when after a few days have passed docking at a nations port that you have suspect status with,the following occurs..A group soldiers gather around the player and you get options like with the bounty hunters but with the following.your wanted for questioning at the residence/court.option .1.go peacefully .2.it was not me i am not a pirate honest.3.take me if you can.4.bribe the soldiers.Maybe fast travel could also be interupted like with the message something has happened along your journey,only to find yourself in front of the governor.with more options to explain yourself,plead for mercy,lie.pay penalty,time in jail,etc.Of course this would have less chance of occuring at night and depending on player stats..luck,stealth etc.New mission types could be made imagine pleading for mercy as an option and finding yourself as a restricted officer/captain/soldier with a rebellious crew all around you,ready to strike you down at the first wrong move you make,while on a penalty mission.Another option is rather strange but here goes.The governor gives player a bottle of pioson to drink and sends player on a mission to be completed in a month,going back to the governor upon completion gives the (governors antidote) as payment.All this could give a governor leverage over the player if player chooses that particular punishment from a list of options.The new type of antidote called the (governors antidote) could be a rare item found at locations in the new world and could be used if mission is failed or if player just chooses not to complete the mission.Going back to that residence after failing a mission or non completion would result in being attacked by the guards.What would really be fun is if the governor just gave pioson to the player and then sets the player free to find his own (governors antidote)within a month.I could imagine this would be quite amusing for a very vain governor from that time period.Governor and the local aristocracy would be having bets on whether or not a person would survive or not.If a vain governor lost a bet he would become incensed.Player could end up becoming the pet project of enraged governors who would of course have different personalities from each other..

• This reply was modified 5 years, 11 months ago by ians.

[Maltacus]

Currently the breastplates made of metal together with other materials are all outclassed by even the English placard, and by the time you have the cuirass skill those are widely available. I propose that those low-level breastplates should be changed to not require the cuirass skill, like the corsair officer girdle. I see two arguments for is:
.
Game wise: As said, the leather and brigandine chest armors are outclassed by things that are as available. They serve very little or no useful purpose in the vast majority of games. It would be more interesting to have a greater variety of armor available and make the cuirass skill less vital, which opens up greater flexibility in skill allocation.
.
Real-life-wise: The non-metal breastplates are flexible and not much different than thick and bulky clothes to fight in (which several characters evidently excel in doing…) and should therefore not require a special skill. The all-metal breastplates on the other hand are stiff and rigid and that should be the thing that requires special training to get used to.

[Oldtimer]

Agree with that.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 9 months ago by Oldtimer.

[Vincent]

I might have said it before, but I’ll say it again; I want some major tweaks made to the first-person ship combat’s cannon aiming mechanics. A more well-defined and easier-to-see crosshair is the first change I want. The second is a better aiming ‘angle’, so to speak. Essentially, I want to be able to fire my ship’s guns at maximum range (using first-person aiming) without having to look up at the clouds to do so.

Also, I would very much like to see the stealth skill be made more useful. As it stands (from what I can tell, anyways) even having the skill at level 100 isn’t truly useful. Personally, I want to see the stealth skill allow me to enter enemy ports and towns without being detected if I’m flying that nations flag. So, at level 100, I should either never get caught when doing so, or I should only very rarely be caught (say, I have a 98-99% chance to evade enemy detection at Lv.100 Stealth). As an addition, I think the detection mechanics should be adjusted so that there is only a chance of being detected when I enter an enemy harbor, each time I enter a town from the harbor or jungle, or when I do something suspicious – the guards probably aren’t going to care in other instances unless I have a bounty and they recognize my face. Continuing that last line of thought, the chance of getting caught should also go up a bit if I have a bounty set by that particular nation, with the chance being higher or lower based on the value of the bounty.

[Filipe]

The chances to get past an officer at an enemy harbour are more or less 83% if you have lvl 100 in stealth, but you got need at least lvl 20 to do that as the equation is: 20 + (random number from 0 to 50) + (random number from 0 to 50 again).
I generally subtract that 20 and add 10 to each random chance so I’ll be able to have a chance before lvl 20 to get at the harbour, tho at lvl 100 the chance of getting caught is the same.
IMO 83% is very solid and at lvl 20 you have 16,6%, lvl 30 25%, lvl 40 33,3%, lvl 50 41,6%, lvl 60 50% and so on. Is valid to note that IRL even if you’re a true expert at sneaking there will always be a chance to get caught.
I think the only thing that makes Stealth no very attractive is the fact that is hard and/or boring to lvl it up as there is not many ways to do so. We could add some code to give it when an enemy ship or squadron is sunk and left with no survivors or witnesses like in the open ocean far away from the crowded harbour.

[Jeffrey]

I tend to agree with Filipe, in that if there is any tweaking to be done with stealth, it is probably pretty minor, as the calculation seems fairly decent at this time, taking into account your reputation, rank and stealth points, and as mentioned, there will never be a 100% chance IRL, but the current probability is pretty high, if the above points are sufficiently high.

However, with some discussion with MK, that reticle change might be forthcoming. We will impose some caveats though…it will not be a global change, but rather, depend on carrying some of the cannon-enhancing items, like the gunner’s quadrant. In addition, with those certain items that enhance the reticle, it will also change the first-person firing from requiring one to aim at the proper angle, to instead aim directly to the destination and calculate the angle-of-fire backward, as you are wishing to do. I will look into the math and the code changes required to achieve this. We will also add to the description of the particular items, that carrying/employing them, will change the first-person aiming, so we don’t throw too many people off with a complete change to the existing first-person aiming technique.

[Jeffrey]

Hey Vincent, I got the reticle targeting within the game engine to shoot and have the balls land where you were aiming (assuming you were aiming within cannon range…if not, it will fire max distance if you click the trigger). Now I just need to add the code to limit that feature to if you have those gunner items I mentioned, and also adjust the targeting now to turn color if there is a target in your crosshairs (rather than high up, where the parabola arc would land at a target, like it does now).

Almost there…

[Jeffrey]

Something like this?

[ians]

Yes thats a big thing 17th century radio,A nice bit of code in there to represent no witnesses,having said that there is a chance your own crew could talk in the town/tavern,Thats why a suspect status would be a good idea.Plus some town management options.I have not tested this yet,If i smuggle goods in to one of my own towns Port Royal then do i get confronted by pirates,I suppose If caught I will have to put a bounty on my own head.I will try this later..as I own Port Royal

[Jeffrey]

If there are no other ships around, no witnesses, we have on the list “to do” to eliminate or greatly reduce the likelihood (based on some character stats, like reputation for instance) of nations getting hostile/notified of your attacking their ships.

[ians]

I tried to test what would happen If I smuggle in to my own port but I cant seem to find a single smuggler in the tavern.I did about 2 weeks of renting room,going in out of tavern but no smugglers they all seem to have a taste for playing cards.

[Jeffrey]

I just checked, and if you “own” the town, there will never be smugglers in the tavern. An existing feature from the original COAS code.

[Oldtimer]

Hi all,

an idea for a possibly bloodless quest(s) could be to restore damaged magical item(s) to working order. There is at least one such item in the game.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Vincent]

That’s really good, Jeffrey, awesome work! The only other change I would like to see is to make the aiming indicator/reticle easier to see – it’s so small that it can be hard to see sometimes, especially in in the dark. I’d like to see something a bit thicker and/or more prominent so that it’s easier to see both the reticle and the color indications. Awesome work, though!

Otherwise, that’s really excelent, and I like the idea of tying it in with different gunnery items. I would like to see those items work for you when given to the chief gunner as well.

Also, have you guys made any progress on allowing certain items to provide benefits to the player when stored in their ship’s chest? I think these would be an excellent candidate for that, since they’re really only useful when I’m on my ship – why would I be carrying them around when I go ashore?

[Jeffrey]

That cannon ability will take effect with the various gunner implements when either you or your gunner have them.

I also finally changed the fact that the Storm Engine never switched the billow direction for square sails on ships like this:

I’ve changed that. Also, the perpendicular square sails, when meeting a headwind, always turned the wrong angle, so I changed that too.

Also, the lights only turned on/off when you exited/entered sea mode. In other words, if it was dark, and you entered your ship, the lights were on, but if you stayed at sea until daylight, they stayed on…forever. And vice versa, if it turns dark after you entered your ship in day, the lights never turned on. Now they turn on/off even when at sea.

Both of these projects seem simple, but the constraints of the existing mechanics of the engine made them a bit trickier than I anticipated. But I got it done.

Still working on stuff…your ship chest idea is still on the to-do list.

As for the reticle, I am no graphic artist (the irony being I long-worked at a company called Graphic Arts Center, LOL)…that stupid little change I already made took way longer than it probably should have. Not sure I’m gonna revisit that. Feel free take a crack at what you would like to see though I’ll run it by the “boss”…I don’t mind. 🙂

[Vincent]

I’ll see about possibly coming up with something, though no promises.

Also, while I’m thinking about it, I wanted to mention one more thing I’d like to see done by the dev team going forward. In particular, I’d like to see Orazio go through the collection of ship models we already have, and fix up the ones that the team plans of keeping. The reason I say this is because we have some truly beautiful ship models in the game now, and many of the older models just don’t match up graphically. Many of these lesser models are still quite good though, and only need a bit of touch-up work to smooth curves and add more details to get them to a level where they will look good alongside the newer models. Others, like the Old Dutch Handelsschip, need a lot more effort. I’m always excited to get new ships, but I honestly feel that the need has now arisen for older ship models to get a facelift, rather than just giving us new ships while ignoring the older, less graphically up-to-date models.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 10 months ago by Vincent.

[Oldtimer]

This…

[Vincent]

Hey, I made a custom flag for my character (Svendsen) and wanted to know if you could put it into the Personal flags selection for mas, as I have no idea how to do so.

Here’s the flag I made;

[modernknight1]

Hiya Vincent,

Well Jeffrey is planning to expand the flag texture even larger because I have found some more historical flags for our period I want to include. I LOVE correct historical variety and flavor. This was a time of NON uniformity. I think that is one of the reasons why I love it so much more than the later 18th century Nelson era that is always SO popular – everything is so uniform and looks alike – in my book – BORING…

Here is the current flag texture: https://www.minds.com/BuccaneersReef?fbclid=IwAR11mWyq0EYMFqn6psQKkBmlQZMl6K9g7Di_Fy-Fjnw7Dc7ZgBAh14yF2KI

So yes I will include this when we do the expansion.

On your questions regarding ship replacement – that’s mostly what I am working on right now (facelifts). Look at the screenshots thread to see a couple new ones. If you look at the modeling contest links and the topic about what we are missing I talk about replacing the Handelschip and will do so once we have a good model. There were tons of these still around at the time. In fact I just found evidence of DeGraaf and Van Hoorn capturing a pair of them under the Dutch West India Company (WIC) and taking them to Petit Goave. No loyalty to country LOL. Here’s the discussion I am referring to: https://buccaneersreef.com/modeling-contest/ships-that-we-are-missing/

For texture modification on your own you need the ConvertorTX tool and a copy of Photoshop. There are tutorials for this stuff as well. The thing to remember that I had to learn through trial and error is to change the resolution on the opened texture in Photoshop from 72 to 500 before you work on it. Then compress it down in the TGA format to a smaller canvas size when its time to see how it looks on the ship, model, building, etc… Here’s a link to the discussion on the modder tools you will need. https://buccaneersreef.com/forums/topic/ship-modeling-and-modding-tutorials/ Click on the LINK TO STORM ENGINE PIRATE GAME MOD TOOLS:

Good Luck and let me know how it goes.

MK

[Vincent]

Thanks, MK. I’m trying to make a texture based on the look of the Dying Gull from PotC5. Basically, it’s going to be the characters first ship, so I wanted something that was an old, rotten, leaky tub (“It’s a piece of junk!” to quote a famous movie line…) – but it’s YOURS. So, any advice you could give on how I would go about achieving such a heavily weathered and worn look would be greatly appreciated.

[Filipe]

I would like to see the energy cost removed when you’re running with the blade unsheeted and press the button to go slightly sideways but not dashing to the side to dodge an attack, I normally run with the blade unsheeted inside caves and use A or D to maneuver objects instead of doing with the camera as I find it kind dizzy and in doing so I lose my precious energy.

[Jeffrey]

This is fair. I notice the character doesn’t really strafe right/left while running anyway, so penalizing energy for something the character doesn’t really do is unfair. I did what you asked and it will be available in next update.

[chris gardner]

What does the future of this game look like? MK and Jeffrey, have you guys thought about starting a Patreon/crowd funding account for funds to maybe create a new game using a unity engine or something? One that is along the lines of AOP2 but more modern and refined? You guys seem very dedicated and driven by your love for this game and time period, I’d like to see you guys branch out. I believe there is a niche to be found in the pirate rpg/sandbox genre, and AOP2/ERAS really feels like it nails the fundamentals of it down. I think I’d speak for a lot of us who are interested in the age of sail and rpg/sandbox games, that id love to see more games of this genre come out, and done properly, and given the effort you guys give for this game after so many years, I can think of no one better suited for designing and constructing a vision of the next generation sailing rpg. I’d love to see a new age of sail game with the fundamentals of AOP2/ERAS, graphics like Naval action, an interactive economy like an X3 space sim game, and modern AI npc logic for enemies and allies alike.

Idk, that’s been on my mind lately. I love ERAS. It’s one of the few games, and only modded “indie” one, that i keep finding myself coming back to year after year. It feels timeless. I want to see elements of it continue to evolve

[modernknight1]

@Vincent So I haven’t seen the last two POTC movies. I was unhappy with where the franchise was going.

I did really like the first one even though it was set in the completely wrong time – 1750. They have continued to attempt to bring out the old piratey stuff to include ship designs from the 17th century and mix them with the Nelsonian era British East India Company and organized and uniform British Empire from 1800.

It’s like they are attempting to bring us the world found in the LEGO pirate sets. It’s just frankly too over the top for a passionate historian of the actual true high age of piracy era (1640-1715) – like me. The only video game I’ve really seen get this right is the classic Sid Meier’s Pirates.

So I took a look at images of the Dying Gull and I actually like it. So I am going to make another very worn skin of both the Sloop1 (which looks a lot like the ship) and the new Snauw. I am nearly done with the current set of new skins for the next major update, so will do these next – not very hard actually. I think the result will be cool. With the new repaint feature now available in some shipyards you can get the distressed aged skin if you end up with one of those ships.

@Chris Gardner

When I first started Buccaneer’s Reef breaking away from PA! I had been attempting to gather funding on a next gen true historical age of piracy simulation. I had promises from several generous and affluent people for nearly two thirds of what I estimated it would take to start a new gaming company IPO from scratch based on a presentation I gave to them – the estimate included purchased location, new building construction, server farm, machines, software necessary, licensing with other for contributions to sound, animations, models etc, salaries for the employees, etc etc… – AND in the presentation I illustrated how the game was going to work and what it would look like and how it could be expanded into a whole new series of pirate adventure and tactical/strategic games both on and off line and for phones as well.

Needless to say we are talking about a few million dollars here. Just the labor to build it from scratch would take half of that. I wasn’t going to launch with only part of what I needed. What is unfortunate is that a couple of those people are rich enough to have funded the whole thing alone by themselves and hardly miss the money spent.

I have the background to do this. I am a retired LtColonel who ran the second largest simulated training center in the world for four years. Before that I was the Program Manager and Developer for the most complex Artillery simulation in the world – FireSim XXI – and participated with my team in some of the most cutting edge experiments and exercises the US military ever ran. We received many awards for our work.

I can say without a doubt that it was the falling out from PA! and all of the public negativity and nastiness when I got banned from there, that derailed the whole thing and made all of these folks (understandably) have huge doubts about ole Asperger Aaron Shields to follow through when it looked like I had lost the very community I was attempting to make my customer. It was very unfortunate and no one is more sorry or more angry about how it all turned out than me.

So short answer – I have never attempted to put that all back together again and have chosen instead to concentrate on what we already know and love and already legally own and modify. There is still SO MUCH to be done with what we currently have.

Don’t get me wrong – I would still love to do something like that again – but the rich guys are going to have to approach me this time – I’m not going to try to panhandle again after everything that’s happened. So that said – I think chances are pretty slim that will ever happen. As Jeffrey said, when he read the question, “Well I would have to quit my regular job, so is someone going to pay me a couple hundred thousand to build this new game?” I am busy myself, but retired so have more time than Jeff I think and a nice pension to sustain me. But if we did something like that I would need a salary as well so that I could cover relocating – etc…

As it stands now – we ARE in the process of starting a PATREON campaign – BUT its to get our efforts HERE and NOW off the ground much faster. With the PATREON funds we could buy labor in the form of a good multi faceted interface and implementation guy who would build us a dynamic scene editor which would allow importation and animation of content from many other sources – SEE METT’s editor they are using for the Secret Shore game. WE NEED THAT.

Jeff could use another coder to assist him especially with the new quest implementation, dialogues, etc… We also need a new webmaster that could actually build us a new website from scratch or finish the 85 percent solution in Linux that Ian abandoned.

We are hoping for growth and more promotion once we start releasing the new Famous Pirate Battles DLCs. Perhaps someone will notice us and want to help. One can only hope.

I still have high hopes for what we are doing. Thank you for your kind words about ERAS. Indeed, this is a passion and I truly hope to bring us to even a much higher level than we currently are.

MK (Aaron R. Shields)

[Oldtimer]

Mr. Knight,

I think you are right abt. a huge yet untapped potential in Maelstrom engine. Some things I suppose could be done with very little effort, except maybe for time needed. I think CONSISTENCY and realism, again. I`ve been ranting abt. that regularly.

Yet more examples:

– the officer icons top left do not conform with their full scale look. Like green dutch uniformed elderly man is a fresh-faced youngster top left.

– some life/navigation sustaining goods should never be contraband: sailcloth, planks, powder, ship handweapons, rations, cannon ammo and medicine.

– Barco Costero is described as faster and more manouverable than tartana. It generally isnt. Snauw is described as a fast and manouverable small pinnace. It generally isnt.

Perhaps addressing such small issues could be worthwhile and improve immersion for little effort.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[modernknight1]

Hello Oldtimer,

I agree about the consistency and you should understand that consistency is something that I have improved over time. Just look at speed and ship handling since 2013. Look at how much the scale has increased. Ships never had speeds below 10 in COAS and the old GOF mods. Now we have ships as slow as 6. I plan on scaling that down even more so that ship performance continues to have more of a realistic spread based on what the ship is. Fast is relative. Certainly a ship can be considered fast within a certain class or another. In the next major update (when the new ships are released and Jeffrey’s new repel boarders perk and multi boarding perk and capability are released, you will notice that I have tuned ship performance numbers across the board once again to reflect that consistency and realism.

I have done the same sort of thing with cannon performance and I think everyone will be blown away when they see what I’ve done and how many more different guns will be available.

Portraits are another thing that I continue to fix slowly over time. There are more new characters in this next major update as well. Keep in mind when I first expanded the characters it was at breakneck speed and often late at night – so I left things out here and there that have slowly been corrected and I am certain eventually portraits will be one of those things.

Another mod I have been working on that Jeffrey is going to help me with is additional cargo items – including grog and water – which will be consumable goods that act like rum as well with different bonus levels for crew morale. I disagree with you about ship stores being contraband. If buying and selling with your own faction they should not be, but with other nations – not necessarily so. In my book research I found various moratoriums issued (especially with the English) that prohibit the selling of ships stores (repair items – timber, masts, tar, canvas, rope, weapons, etc) to foreign ports or merchants – especially during wartime. This was a punishable offense and captains whose ships didn’t have the right documentation bound for obvious foreign ports, could have their ship and cargoes legally seized and sold as a prize by inspecting English patrol vessels.

Slaves is another item I am overhauling in this mod. Slaves will be contraband in all Spanish colonies and the main places where they will be bought and sold will be Port Royal, Bridgetown, Willemstad, Fort de France, and Port au Prince. The new town of Middleburg (Dutch Surinam) will also buy and sell them on the new map when its done. There will be active smugglers in Caracas and Coro (new town) that will gladly accept slaves in Spanish America. Slaves will die much faster – especially on smaller ships and they will consume your food and water. In this mod, documents will have to be stamped and fees paid at the port controller, to legally sell and unload certain goods.

I’m all about consistency and your comments and help to get us there is always appreciated (as it is from our entire community). I personally really love hearing from you guys and knowing how much you are enjoying the game and offering your thoughts on how we can continue to improve it. Thanks to you and all of our active participants. I am sorry I have not been so active lately but when our web guy abandoned me after so much time and money spent – I felt like an entire Rugby team just took turns punching me in the gut. I’m just starting to get my motivation back – mainly because of Jeffrey’s enthusiasm and continued improvements. If not for Jeffrey, this site and everything here would have died several years ago, because I had lost the will to do it alone. So thank God for Jeffrey!

MK

• This reply was modified 5 years, 9 months ago by modernknight1.
• This reply was modified 5 years, 9 months ago by modernknight1.

[Oldtimer]

Mr. Knight,

I agree with you abt. ship stores(a parallel to warhorse export being a capital offense in many countries) though I would make an exception for foodstuffs and medicine.

Returning to DLC development how are pirate battles to be? As special quests or random meetings with your competitors/enemies which I would like better?

Rgds, Oldtimer

[modernknight1]

Oldtimer,

As the label “Historic” implies, they will be actual real battles that occured we are recreating. So when you open the DLC it will show you a menu of four battles. (Each DLC has four for $7 dollars) Then you can click on each one and read a historical narrative about what happened at the battle.

Then you can choose the option to start as one side or another (EXAMPLE: Blackbeard or Lieutenant Maynard) then you push difficulty setting and then start battle. If you win, there will be an option screen that comes up that says: “Would you like to continue into the sandbox mode of the game starting with the character ship(s) and treasure you’ve acquired from this battle”.

If no, it exits back to the main DLC battle menu, IF YES, then you start the game with the ships and weapons, crew and stuff that you gain by the end of the famous battle.

For example if Bartholomew Roberts changes history, and instead of dying in Africa killed by a cannon ball, he actually ducks and wins against the English Royal Navy warship Swallow that was sent to bring him in – then you can begin the regular sandbox game with him starting with an already significantly leveled up character, good equipment acquired like a Royal Navy captain’s sabre and pistol, AND both the Royal Fortune, Ranger, Little Ranger AND the captured RN warship Swallow. If you play as RN Captain Ogle then you get all of Robert’s ships and special stuff if you decide to start the game there. In either case you will magically be transported from the coast of Africa to the middle of the Caribbean when the game begins after completion of the DLC battle.

Make sense?

MK

[Oldtimer]

Mr. Knight,

makes sense ofc. What I never understood is why player cannot meet other heroes outside taverns and interact with them. They have lives(eternal?) in the background, gain lvls, change ships, join factions. Would having them visible and interactive in the whole game world put too much stress on the engine or take too much time for the devs?

And more abt. consistency: char descriptions are sometimes misleading. IIRC starting equipment for some chars is described as meager basic but in reality is really good or v v. Either change description or loadout to solve this when you have time to spare.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Oldtimer]

SKILL ITEMS

Some items still in the game were once skill items and described as if they have bonuses, though they do not. They do not have any bonus points in their description so it is not exactly misleading but maybe confusing.

I would have their bonuses restored and perhaps a set limit on equippable skill items/skill. My house rule is only 1 skill item/skill equipped at any given time excpt. stealth which is way UP as of now.

Another solution is to delete these items from game.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Vincent]

Nice to hear that you liked the look of the Dying Gull, and especially that you decided to do some similar skins for the sloop and snauw. I was originally going to do one for the snauw, but I just couldn’t figure out how to get the look I wanted… sigh. My only request for those skins is that you not use a white lower hull for them, and simply have the heavily weathered texture extend from gunnel to keel. It would be cool if you could figure out a way to include the Dying Gull style windows – the ones with brown, dust covered panes with some missing, but I won’t complain if it doesn’t happen. Thanks so much for this – Ive figured out how to switch Svendsen’s starting ship to the Snauw, and that new heavily weathered skin you’re doing is the one I’d like it to start with. If you could code that change into the game’s files so I don’t have to do it myself after every update, I’d be a very happy man.

Also, I have a few flags that I custom made, though I haven’t found a way to put them into the game – if you’d like, I can send them to you so you can see if you’d like to include any of them.

[Vincent]

Also, I’m still wanting to try my hand at some location modelling – I have a list of scenes I’d like to try recreating in an even better way than they are now. However, I wanted to ask about models, specifically acquiring them. I’ve done some searching on the internet, and I found a site that has a number of tropical plants that would be perfect for jungle scenes, as well as a hat I want to have in the game, a few cool and unique weapons, etc. They can all be acquired for relatively cheap, and they come with a royalty free license, so I was wondering what the devs would think if I chipped in some cash and purchased the models so we could use them in the game, after getting them reviewed for proper compatibility, of course.

Also, I’m quite interested in getting a new, high-quality model for Svendsen (similar quality to the new Helen Tavrel model), and I wanted to know what the devs would say. I’m considewring going to a professional and seeing how much it would cost before saving up and paying for it myself, and I wanted to know if the devs might have some recommendations. As an aside, I’m also considering doing the same for some unique allies and enemies to go along with my planned ‘main story’ questline I’m coming up with for Svendsen.

[Vincent]

New feature requests I came up with;

– support mice with additional buttons; this would be a big improvement.

– allow players to navigate command menus with the scroll wheel, to make it easier to use without needing to move your hands around between different control areas.

– No contraband goods at pirate ports – this seems a bit odd to me.

– No energy cost for doging in combat – this might help even the playing field and make battles a bit more interesting, since there will be less standing still while trading hits. I have a bigger combat suystem overhaul in mind that will retain the majority of the current system while making the whole thing more interesting, but I need time to work it out and write it up. This is the most basic idea I had to improve combat.

– Treat dead bodies like containers, and use the command/action key to loot them when walking over them. I always found it a bit odd that they worked in a separate system with a separate key control.

– Have dead bodies remain where they fall permanently until a scene transition/loading screen – only after that will they disappear. That way, you have enough time to thoroughly loot all of them, especially after a boarding battle.

– Allow players to sort Trade tab lists alphabetically: The current method of organizing the trade tab’s individual entries does so by the date at which the trade catalogs are first acquired, which leads to a jumbled, hard to navigate mess. Instead, I would like to see the trade catalogs ordered alphabetically, with the option to use the catalog’s corresponding nation, town name, or island name as the primary method of organization. At the very least, if we can’t get the different options, I want the default organization to be done alphabetically by town name. This would be a massive quality of life improvement for the game, and should (hopefully) be relatively simple to implement.

– Better integration of first-person perspective: First person perspective can be an interesting way to play, but needs some refinements to integrate it as a fully featured part of the game. As it is now, it seems more like a curiosity that was tacked onto a third person game just so that the game can claim that it has first person perspective as an option.

First, eliminate head bob from the first person camera, or at least make it optional. For some it’s a cool thing, but for me (and probably many others) it’s rather annoying.

Second, make the view point carry through loading screens; if I activate first person camera, and then enter a store, I want my choice of camera view to carry over between the two scenes, rather than needing to constantly reactivate the perspective I want every time I go through a loading screen.

Third, when using first person camera, the game should not activate the slight zoom out near doors that happens in third person, as this can be rather jarring and just seems very counter-intuitive to the use of a first person perspective.

Fourth, expand the camera angles in first person. In Skyrim, a player in first person could look down at their feet, and a similar camera movement allowance would be much appreciated.

Fifth, make the character’s body/model visible in first person view. Skyrim has few mods that make this happen (since the base game doesn’t do this by default), and it should not be terribly difficult to implement, or at least I hope it isn’t. This also opens up the ability to use first person mode in combat. While third-person view may offer a better view of the player’s surroundings, a fully-integrated first person perspective would allow the player to use it even in combat. This would probably necessitate an indicator that the player has been hit, and a very easy way to accomplish this is to add a blood splatter on the edges of the screen (which will fade away afterwards) every time a player is hit.

– National Indicators for conversations with hero captains: I’ve often had some difficulty determining which nation the hero characters work for when approached with offers in the tavern. While some should be obvious, others are not always as easy. So, I’d like to see some kind of indicator showing which nation the hero captains are working for added to conversations with them. This could be as simple as the captain saying which flag they sail under, but a national emblem like the ones in the new game interface might also be a nice way to do it.

– Make player allies/boarding crew/officers immune to player attacks: Honestly, this is one of my biggest pet peeves, and something I’d like to have fixed in future. Currently, it seems as though it is entirely possible for the player to attack their own officers by mistake – though please correct me if I am wrong on this. What I want is to have the game make a players allied NPCs immune to player attacks. That way, I won’t accidentally hurt my own officers when I don’t intend to do so. The same should also apply to the generic crewmen that make up my boarding force, as it is currently rather difficult for me to tell them apart from the enemy boarders.

– Realistic Prices Option Expanded: We already have a realistic prices option for trade goods, and it’s pretty cool; I’d like to see a new option that will apply realistic price values to everything else in the game as well, from patents to trade licenses, swords to trinkets, officer and crew wages, and ships and ship upgrades. This would probably require a lot of work on Jeffrey’s part to code it all into the system, as well as a heap of effort from Modernknight to provide all the appropriate prices, but I really feel that it would be truly worth it. I don’t really like to play with the current realistic costs option on, because it makes being a merchant very unprofitable, and with the high cost of everything else in the game not changing to fall in line with the more realistic prices, it becomes hard to justify the option, especially with all of the new things we can spend it on that are being added to the game.

– Make Tortuga a pirate shipyard: Tortuga was a main pirate hangout during the buccaneering era, despite being owned by the French. As such, I feel that it would only be appropriate that Tortuga’s shipyard be changed to function as a pirate shipyard that can make upgrades to a players ships.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 9 months ago by Vincent.

[Jeffrey]

So far, here’s what I’ve got:

– Treat dead bodies like containers, and use the command/action key to loot them when walking over them: DONE
– Have dead bodies remain where they fall permanently until a scene transition/loading screen: Kinda…just extended timeout to 5 minutes.
– First person make the view point carry through loading screens: DONE
– First person when using first person camera, the game should not activate the slight zoom out near doors: DONE
– Make Tortuga a pirate shipyard: DONE

[Jeffrey]

The following, I can virtually guarantee won’t be done:

– No energy cost for dodging in combat: We disagree with the premise

-First person eliminate head bob from the first person camera: The reason this happens is that instead of idle characters standing like statues when AFK, they have idle animation to look more natural. Since the camera is literally attached to the head of the character, it moves as the character’s head moves. I will not spend any effort to eliminate the idle animations.

-First person make the character’s body/model visible in first person view: Again, the camera is attached to the front of the character’s head (front of face), so the only way to make the character visible would be to move the camera attachment back for every character model, then change the culling mode to make the back of model textures visible, and make a shader to render it only partially opaque. I probably won’t do this and would need someone with modeling skills to change all the character models, which I presume also won’t happen.

-Make player allies/boarding crew/officers immune to player attacks: This is already the case. They get stunned for a brief second, but they assume no actual damage.

[Jeffrey]

– allow players to navigate command menus with the scroll wheel: I made the up/down/left/right command navigation selectable in the control mapping options, so now you can remap the command navigation to mouse scroll

[Jeffrey]

– Allow players to sort Trade tab lists alphabetically: This was impossible to do with the original engine as there was no way to rationally compare alpha strings in a less-than/greater-than fashion; that logic does not exist. For whatever reason, the internal script compiler will compare strings for equality/inequality correctly, but for less/greater, it reverts to comparing string length. I didn’t want to change the compiler because I have no idea if or where they might be relying on that weirdness in any mods/scripts.

But, since you asked, I implemented a way to do this using a new function I added for script use and changed the trade screen…because I’m frickin’ cool that way 😉 Your request is done and ours is the only Storm-based engine that can now compare/sort things alphabetically.

[Vincent]

For just five days of effort, you sure got a lot of things done, that’s so awesome! Thanks for taking the time to work on those little QOL features I requested. The sorting of trade catalogs is especially appreciated, and yes, you ARE cool.

I can understand not wanting to make dodging in combat free, it is YOUR guys’ game after all – I don’t mind it as is, honestly, I just figured I’d throw the idea out there for consideration. Personally, I’d really like to see a future update revamp the combat system into something a bit more modern and active – my personal vision would be something a bit like Skyrim’s combat system, but retaining the multiple different attack and defense actions from Eras’ current system. I know that’s going to be a HUGE overhaul, so I certainly don’t expect anything like that any time soon; I just think that the current combat system, while workable, could do with some updates/tweaks; my one major gripe is the difficulty of some combat scenarios during a few of the questlines, which seem to me like they could do with a bit of reworking to make them more in-line with the average difficulty of the rest of the game – they should be challenging of course, but some of them seem just a little OP to me as they currently are.

I can definitely understand why you won’t do some of the things I requested, especially now that you’ve explained what would have to go into those projects to get them done. It does seem like a lot of effort for little overall benefit to the gameplay value. I was also unaware of the immunity of allied characters to player attacks, so that’s nice to know about, thanks for telling me.

Also, any comments on the other ideas I mentioned, but which you didn’t mention as denied or finished? I’d be very interested in hearing about the dev team’s response to them.

[Jeffrey]

Also, any comments on the other ideas I mentioned, but which you didn’t mention as denied or finished?

I was considering/exploring some of them…like this one.

expand the camera angles in first person.

While exploring the possibility, I found that I was backward on my assessment of the problems viewing the PC in 1st person, but the problems remain the same, but actually apply to this other request.

The camera for my character is actually not planted to the front front of the face, but rather somewhere inside the head; this would make the other request, to view the PC body in 1st person a little easier, since the camera is already in a good place to do that, right? Turns out, wrong, but for similar reasons pertaining to the “shader” effects and such I mentioned, and this is why expanding the camera angle to view feet suffers from a similar fate.

When it comes to coding and the C++ behind the scenes of the engine, I have much experience and can change much if we are dealing with normal coding logic. Where I am weak, is that prior to working on this game, I had zero experience working with DirectX or graphical game concepts. I’ve done much reading, and have learned some, but I am a relative noob.

When I ported from DX8 to DX9, I was successful, which is ironic given I have no knowledge of DX and its APIs. But that was due to the fact that even though I knew nothing, Microsoft gave explicit instructions of how to do the port, and I was able to simply apply normal C++ logic to figure out the gaps.

However, I still don’t have a full understanding of RenderStates, how they work, or how to write a shader, which applies much of the GPU rendering of a scene. In anticipation of a possible move to DX11, I was even able to convert all the existing ASM to HLSL shading, because that would be one of the first requirements of moving up to DX11. However, those .sha files are a combination of RenderState techniques within a “flexible vertex format” (FVF) pipeline, which will also be required to scrap for DX11 and convert the RenderState calls, and actual shader instructions (this is assembly instructions, but newer versions instead require HLSL instructions…I’ve done this, but not released as no need for it in DX9); this is the part I have little understanding and that is what creates much of the effects of blending, altering vertex/mesh coordinates and scene images during GPU passes/rendering.

Which leads us to what I found in the camera angle expansion. First, there are no character feet visible at all when I expand the view:

Exploring the code, I see that some tests are done for camera position to character position are applied and if proximate, alpha is applied to the character. I can actually verify the feet should be visible by looking at the character mesh and I can see the feet:

In addition to the alpha applied, I also see that they remove a “z write” for the mesh, which according to the little bit of graphic knowledge I’ve picked up along the way, allows the GPU pass to test texture pixels on a mesh according to where they fall (in front, behind) other texture pixels in the 3D world. Presumably, they wanted to remove the pixels entirely, by wiping them out with a z test.

When I take that out, now the rest of the “technique + shader” applies to the character, but now we get some unwanted effects due to those instructions. Here we see evidence the camera is actually inside the head position, as the hair mesh and textures, with the current RenderState techniques and shader are applied and because of its z test and other render logic, removes the pixels of the inside walls and we see outside instead:

When I look down, now we see the feet…along with other mess:

I would have to figure out how to adjust the RenderStates, .sha file, shader instructions to deal with this and I don’t have enough knowledge of those graphic questions. I can do the C++ to get us here, as angles and such are self-explanatory math problems. Figuring out RenderStates, z tests, texture blending, etc. is outside the scope of my knowledge; I program accounting and system integration solutions for a living. I figured out a little graphic stuff over course of the last couple years, but nowhere near what I would need to know to accomplish this.

[Filipe]

Would be nice to Select your own PIRATES on auto-levelled characters because as it is it resets the abilities to the minimum and you can’t use that character properly anymore as he doesn’t have the required level for the ship.

[Filipe]

I also would like to see the storm dmg reduced because as it is in just a matter of mins you’re sunk and can’t enjoy the view or make any battles in it because if you’re unlucky and an enemy was in the range you either loses a lot of health or somehow outrun him to extract the battle, and as a side effect of this anchored ships in nearby harbours get auto sunk if given enough time. Maybe give larger ships more resistance than smaller ones and make a ship endure at least 20 min in IRL.

Speaking of enduring more in sea battles I feel that the ratio between sailcloth/planks to the restored health isn’t too great, so maybe ramp up the effectiveness of the abilities of reduced planks/cloths consumed and repair, IMO a carpenter doesn’t need planks to build the ship from scratch, just need to patch holes and stuff like that that in one book it even says in moment of despair one can use a door and things alike for that matter.

[Filipe]

And before I forget, pls remove the dmg of a starting ship as it is the tutorial doesn’t make sense anymore especially for captains with big ships that pay a hell amount of money to repair what supposedly wasn’t even damaged, end of rant.

[Filipe]

I would like to see smarter rapists as they let me get a headstart over them:
– https://drive.google.com/open?id=1AAYoYW5IicOohH1sI9_QybRGMZua2IFi

The same doesn’t happen against bandits and ruffians as I’m a very fair fighter and don’t backstab them.

[modernknight1]

This has been a bad week for me gents. I lost a dog to cancer that I have had for 14 and a half years last Saturday. She was like a little Beagle daughter to me.

Still I have been keeping very busy to keep my mind occupied. I have been spending a lot of time with my other dogs taking them for walks and playing with them, etc. I am a dog person if you haven’t figured that out.

The new patch with all of the new ships characters weapons and new town skins is nearing completion. To see some pics of some of the new ships take a look at my flickr photosteam here: https://www.flickr.com/photos/49225014@N05/

Vincent, I am still working on the fatigued “Flying Gull” version of the Snauw. However, the sloop is finished and will appear along with the other skins for that ship which I have also greatly improved. What do you think of our new Dying Gull?

MK

[Oldtimer]

Mr Knight,

those are nice muscle cars indeed. BTW, the ships are OK…

And now for something different, after last updates the annoying presence of NPC heroes at taverns their country is at war with has increased. AFAIU it should not be too hard to code it so that they do not unless they have a trading license in their inventory or extreme stealth.
On the same tack I do think that most of the NPC heroes should not change their allegiance randomly as they seem to do now. Bartolomeu ò Portugues or Roc Brasiliano in Spanish service!? Neither should men like Spragg senior or d`Estrèes turn pirate…
And there is my earlier suggestion that officers and LoM holders should not propose to attack their countrymen, allies and to them neutral countries.

These are really immersion destroying annoyances and should IMO be your top priority to change.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[Filipe]

I would like to see the Hero Types having some intrinsic bonuses instead of having only a Perk bonus that will be taken anyway. For example, the Carpenters having some bonuses in ship repair that are outside the perks so it will add more depth to the game and make choices so more needed according to the gameplay that you want.
And maybe even perks that have different effects according to what Type you chose.

[Filipe]

Would be awesome if skeletons didn’t get hemorrhage and fill the caves with blood as that’s not immersive at all.

[megaprime]

I have a suggestion for next update

Can we tone down the rate at which valuable items appear?
These are too frequent, makes it really easy to become rich
I just made a level 1 character, very fresh start with 5 luck no enhancements from items
I play as a dutchman so I attacked a little english convoy, 2 schooners
The captain had 3!!! gold cash in his pocket
One gold cash costs 280000 pesos its waaay too much
The realistic costs for cargo is really great I think we should tone down the prices of these items to acceptable levels comperable to cargo and make said items very rare
Right now you become really rich from just looting bodies
Its also easy to get rich from hero captains
As they typically spawn near a fort and when you get attacked by them ,when quitting the deal they get gunned down by the fort
And the Ai likes to make suicide runs against the fort

thank you for your attention

[megaprime]

Is it possbile to make the ships of the hero captains spawn rather far from the fort when you meet with them, for example near a shore?

[Oldtimer]

THIS!

I have suggested earlier that chance to find item should be set by player. Do not know how how hard it is to code that though.

Rgds, Oldtimer

[megaprime]

Also I think the cheap cargo like clothes,paprika,fruits etc should weigh less like 2-3 units and maybe make it cost a tiny bit more to make it worth trading
Right now the only goods worth trading with are the bottom ones like tool,dye,ebony etc these are the ones worth trading only
You cant really make a living out of the standard goods making them useless. You can actually lose money if you are a little unlucky by trading these as you get 4-5k peso per trade with a 5-7 day trip with a standard class 6-5 ship
A minor thing really but it might help the ingame economy being too onesided with realistic costs and wheight

[megaprime]

Another thing,

Cannonball is really useless when there is hot-shot
The main pro for cannonball is that its cheap but all ammunition is inexpensive
For mid-endgame you want the highest damage possible for your warships cannonball is out of the question
In the beginning you really dont want to waste your gunpowder and potentially cannons for some shitty ammo that has no damage
The other pro for cannonball is range but you cant hit your targets reliably on that range and even if you do you wont do enough damage
And the npc ships mostly use cannonball
On a mission on my previous save, I literally gunnded down a 102 gun Manowar and a 44 gun frigate with my 56 gun 3rd rater just because the ai used cannonball

I would suggest: to maybe make all ammo slightly more expensive (just a minor thing not really important)

If its possible make tha ammo have different reload times: hot-shot,canister shot should have the longest reload times as these would have to be significantly harder to reload
then say a simple cannonball
cannonball would have the shortest reload times,and chain shot would be somewhere in the middle
Now this might be nonsense but I guess hot shot and grapeshot could have a higher chance to blow up your guns then the cannonball-maybe make cannonball a slightly lower chance
to blow up your guns

These are my thoughts please correct if i am wrong

[Vincent]

Hey, MK, sorry about your dog. Our first dog, Katey, died of cancer as well a few years ago, so I know a bit of what you’re going through. Sorry for your loss, but it’s good that you’ve found something to help you deal with the sadness.

On a brighter note, I do like the new sloop skin. I will admit, though, that it does seem a little hard to notice the colors (though I assume that’s due to the game’s lighting effects, which I’d personally like to see edited a bit to make darker colors easier to see and distinguish), but I also think the Dying Gull had a much heavier amount of ramshackle appearance and weathering effects than the current skin does, IIRC. Below is a link to a video on YouTube that has some very good shots of the Dying Gull from multiple angles, and it rally shows off the appearance of the sloop better than any of the images I’ve found using Google searches are for reference material.

I do love the windows, though. So, my only recommendation would be to add lots more weathering – faded spots, darkened spots, and salt stains. Make it look like a real ‘hunk of junk’, as a famous space wizard once said!

Also, I do agree with Filipe on two of the points he raised. First, I’d like to see storm damaged reduced some – the advantage to this change would be the ability of ships to weather a few storm scenes when necessary, allowing us to sail through large storms without almost guaranteeing our deaths, and allowing us to enjoy the awesome storm effects. It also allows players to involve themselves in epic battles fought in the midst of a storm, which is something that could make a nice change from the regular battles.

Second, if I try to edit the PIRATES stats of a character with a higher starting level to something I like better, the game does not retain the bonus skill levels and reverts them to the level one values. I really feel that this is an issue that needs to be squashed – if I edit the PIRATES stats, the character’s skill levels should change accordingly, but should retain the bonuses calculated by the character’s higher starting level.

Also, just as an aside, two other requests for storms. First, I’d like to see all rain effects edited to make them more noticeable – as it is currently, it can be difficult for me to realize that it’s raining. So, louder/more distinctive sound effects for the rain, but primarily more easily noticeable rain droplets are what I’d like to see. Another thing I would really like to see is for players to be able to sail out of a storm without needing to use the world map – or for the storm to peter out after a while of real-time sailing in it. This would be a big step forward, since one of the things I’d like to see this game accomplish is to make the world map a feature that is completely optional, allowing players the choice to use it if they want, while also being able to completely ignore it if they desire to do so.

[Author]

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