What do you love/hate about the game?

[Raul]

I thought it would be interesting to see what people love and hate about the original game.

So I will start ;):

-What I love: The feeling of freedom, attack, kill, steal whatever you want, conquer your own city or perhaps make an all powerful nation in the game. It always had a tiny surprise that I didn’t find before, I remember that the first time that I played the game didn’t expect anything happening when I “bought the services of a prostitute”, good thing that I was alone hahaha.

I liked the “important quests”, even if they were hard to find or continue. It always gave me a feeling of “there are secrets everywhere, you just have to find them!”.

Lastly I love the feeling of just using one ship to fight against 10 or so. When I first did the spanish questline I was like “okay, let’s do it!”, many fights and quite funny to play.

-What I hate: First of all it was the interactions with all characters. You can’t have friends, people that fear you, people that may love you… yeah I know Isabella but she was… I don’t think I need to explain it, basically the first time I married her I was like “I deserve a perk for marrying her” and then I thought the perfect one, increased critical chance, “the suffering on your weak point makes you see clearer those of others”, I have to say that marriage in this game was useless or even worse, a waste of money and time.

On that line it was weird when I had “fun” with the tavern girl that the second or third time that I did it she sent the guy to kill me. I kind of wonder… does this game have any memory of what I do except my reputation?. Even more on that point I would at least have expected that the game would take into account if I was a great pirate for greetings, something “glory based” I would say.

Another thing is that I would have liked if enemy countries could take cities from their enemies, without player intervention.

Finally I would say that I kind of hate those quests in which you have to go and try find some bullshit ship in the middle of the sea. I prefer those types of quests to tell me where to go and that I may get it if I arrive soon, kind of like in the spanish storyline when you go to capture the child of the moneylender.

So… what do you think? is there anything that you love about the game that you want to add? or perhaps something that you hated so much that you can’t help but share it?.

[modernknight1]

Well I was glad to see you post this Raul. I waited for a week to see if anyone would answer you. Disappointing… oh well. If people wonder about my low amount of participation it should really be no surprise. I have a lot of new stuff nearly ready. When I am motivated by encouragement from others I put stuff up quickly – otherwise I just sit on it for sometimes a very long while – assuming folks just don’t care anyway.

So I guess I will answer you. Jeffrey frustratingly jokes that I am the only one playing the game anyway! LOL

I LOVE the freedom as well. Funny comment on the port whores! LOL. You should try opening one of the subquests Jeffrey has working that never worked with the original vanilla game. If you go see the same girl over and over again she will give you a great little treasure quest. It needs to be one of the girls that likes you in the dialogue. Not one of the ones who tells you that you just need to shut up and pay and stuff like that.

I too love going at daunting odds in ship fights. I often will take on a ship that’s above my ability. If you’ve seen my video on taking the Kornelia – that’s the sort of fight we are talking about.

Jeffrey has been working on a new capability that I asked him to try and he says he thinks it is very possible. I have yet to announce it but will talk about it anyway because of the lack of participation. So imagine having a new perk MASTER BOARDER which allows a new capability to open up called MULTI-BOARDING with an icon showing three grappling hooks instead of one. When the icon lights up and you have more than one ship next to the ship you want and the other captains on your other ships have that same perk – then they will board with you at the same time adding their crew numbers to your own! i think he is fairly close to having that one finished! So that’s something to look forward to. This will make it even easier to take those big ships with fleets of smaller ones.

I too wish that there was some way to have closer friendships. We attempted that by describing who the characters worked with and hated (who their enemies are) in the bios so that you can play with gamesmanship rules applied knowing that you would want to recruit such and such and that you would never even approach so and so. It would be cool if we could get some kind of mechanic in the game I agree.

Jeffrey changed the code so that over a long time if you have long relationships with officers that they will swing your way eventually and become “DEVOTED” meaning that they are sort of your friends so to speak.

Concerning enemies taking cities, I think this does actually happen after you have played through the national quests.

Others love and hate the ship seeking quests. Jeffrey has made these better and he has even changed the goods on the ships in rumors to generate better more valuable cargoes at my request. Otherwise why would there be a rumor about it? Right?

More quests are in the works – that’s all I can tell you.

Thanks for the comments Raul and welcome to the Reef!

MK

[Oldtimer]

@raul, modernknight1

Well, you actually have had lots of feedback and suggestions already. From Maltacus, Vincent and myself among others.

I do not think you need more as of now considering the workload already present. Polish up what you have, enable actions present already in code but not firing and if you want to change your work priorities you always have the possibility to unbungle the quest melèe…

Upgrade graphics to latest std if you feel you have time to spare. Meaning that rigging, deck and hull are at hoy quality level. Some ships look good in one or two departments and seem obsolete in others, like the deck of light merchant schooner for example.

Consistency + plausibility = immersion

Keep up the good work says,

Oldtimer

[modernknight1]

Yes we have had lots of feedback and I very much appreciate it. Jeffrey has worked a lot of that into the game already and is working on more stuff as we speak. We also have a very long priority list of things we are working on.

I am due to talk to our webmaster and site re-builder face to face in less than two weeks time. Only a face to face meeting will allow me to see close up the options he has come up with for both layout and hosting options and the time to make it work. He has taken it as far as he can without me talking to him in person. This has been the delay.

Many things have delayed us from going forward. I have been delayed from traveling numerous times but am on the road now. Our legal team has been extremely unresponsive and Jeffrey has been calling and trying to get answers for weeks. We cannot get to the next stage on the STEAM/Itch.io and DLC releases until the legal team completes its work.

We’ve had a large amount of people join as members in the last several months but very few bother commenting or adding opinions to topics. Perhaps because I haven’t posted anything on the main page could be why. The current WordPress package has become so ungainly and so unresponsive that it took me an hour just to edit one article last week after a dozen tries.

Anyway, the forum at least functions and here is where I get demoralized. No one but a few people like Oldtimer, Malticus, etc are interested anymore. Perhaps we’ve taken this thing as far as its going to go…

When I see no contribution I simply start working and researching on my books rather than the game – which is probably a better use of my time anyway. I’ve written two whole chapters in two different books in just the last week alone!

I did fight a Spanish treasure fleet though which was great fun: https://www.facebook.com/buccaneers.reef

OR if that one wont let you see it: this link: https://www.facebook.com/Buccaneers-Reef-360002584184524/

MK

• This reply was modified 6 years, 3 months ago by modernknight1.

[Oldtimer]

Mr Knight,

“very few bother”, well it could be a sign that they are pleased enough with things as they are not to feel commenting as necessary.

“a long priority list” could actually mean that there are no priorities. Perhaps if that list was posted more people would comment/suggest on the direction for development. Myself I seem to recall yours saying that a enlarged and improved map was among your top priorities and I would much like to have that as prio no. 1.
I would say that a map approaching the quality and realism of Pirates2 by Sid M. is what I`m looking forward to.

Rgds,

Oldtimer

[Oldtimer]

In addition to the above perhaps judging the interest for GoF would be more realistic by taking no of downloads and site views as a measure, not only comments.

Rgds,

Oldtimer

[Raul]

Haha I was just making a post about those things that I like/dislike about the game overall, to tell you the truth I played the vanilla version of AOP2:COAS for a long time and until this summer I just forgot it.

Then… discovered this mod and enjoyed it and made me think about those many things that I like about the game and dislike, just wanted a slow chat about what we all like that is already found in the game.

Personally I started playing games like these since patrician 3 and port royale 2, those two games had many things that I loved in games. In patrician 3, while it was more on the administrative side, I could do quite a few interesting things like having “pirate allies sending me money that they obtain”. In fact I would say that a pirate king isn’t someone that has the best ships but rather someone that people respect and if they see your flag they will leave.

In port royale 2 it was kind of the same but with a bigger focus on battles, you could capture cities for certain countries and the thing that I liked the most is that by defeating convoys you weakened a country, if you weaken it too much then you could do a conquer quest to make a nation stronger. That was fantastic.

Finally I found age of pirates 2: COAS, never got to see the first one, but in this one I felt it was less generic in the sense that I was a character, I could walk around the city or explore multiple things. It added many things that I truly wanted to a pirate game. Of course it has some bad points as you can easily see when you read my comment on some points of other “similar games”.

Kind of hoped to be able to buy a AOP 3, when I found SD: TEHO I thought I found it, but that wasn’t it. While not trying to do a bad review or anything like that I just think it is a mod rather than a new game and between ERAS and it… well there isn’t really a choice for me. Rather than an unique storyline for one character I would have liked if they focused more on options and what you can do. Perhaps expanding non ship options, adding criminality to cities, having bandit gangs perhaps?. Even a tiny thing like being able to get a spouse would be great (in fact even better if there are multiple options).

I have a lot of hopes and dreams that one day I can buy a true AOP3 but the hope part is quite low at the moment, still have dreams at least.

[modernknight1]

I agree on all things you desire and we are working to make much of that happen. You may have already noticed that you might run into a lot more thugs in the jungles and a lot more bounty hunters as well. Because you can command up to 6 fighters Jeffrey and I thought that the encounters with thugs/outlaws should be much more challenging the more men you have or the higher level you are. You may find yourself faced with over 10 opponents at times! The vanilla game only ever had 3 or 4 thugs.

I have been developing an alternative marriage quest for a long while now. The “Anneke Quest”. She is the governor of Curacao’s daughter. It is very much like the Isabella Quest but better and I based it off the Isabella questline code. If you succeed and she marries you instead of her getting on your case, each time you come home she has gifts for you in useful items, treasure maps and treasure rumors as well.

Jeffrey also has been working to allow you to buy your own house in any town. This is the first step you need to take – in order for a new feature to work that he is building as a game feature – and that is to propose marriage to any single woman in the game – barmaids, girls on the street – even whores – even female hero characters! However, choose wisely because they could end up being a bitch like Isabella or a sweetheart like Anneke.

For your discussion here I am happy to welcome to the Loyal members group Raul – you will shortly be given instructions on how to download a better version of the game with much more content. Antiscamp will also be added for introducing himself after an entire year with no one posting anything to that thread. Congratulations.

MK

• This reply was modified 6 years, 3 months ago by modernknight1.

[Maltacus]

About a year and a half ago I sat down and started to search for mods for pirate games. Mods. Not the games themselves. Sticking with a vanilla version of any game was unthinkable to me, after long experience with total war games and their superb mods and lacklustre original content. I found out about something called new horizons and something called gentlemen of fortune. So…they needed these two games apparently. Age of Pirates II was easier to get so I started with it, and never got into the former alternative.
My experience with the original game is pretty much installing, checking to see that it runs, installing mods.
Love and hate, though, is a lot.
Love the skies and sea most of the time, great stuff even before the huge improvements.
Sailing small vessels and outflanking large ones.
Having the enemy trap themselves in Bermuda.
Sinking the English.
Trading and discovering new trade routes.
Hate several things with corrosive vehemence:
Ships turning on the spot and without wind.
Idiotic and illogical fights without the officers.
The way boarding and fighter generation in general works with superhuman hit points and few demigod sailors on the deck instead of many normal ones like a real crew.
The undead in caves (the ‘dutchman is a well known legend, so it has more of a place as symbol for superstitions of the time).
The overshadowing focus on swordfighting and indeed fighting as the only solution for anything. No true role-playing if there is always only one way to act.
Then I strumbled across this mod – stumbled for it is hard to find by general internet searching – and was caught up from the start. Finally someone apparently sharing some interest in realism as it seemed. Uninstalled it all a year ago being fed up with the bad things still in it and the difficulty of modding. Restarted a few weeks ago with a custom-made character with the goal of learning to mod all things I miss in the game along is career. The biggest change undoubtly being when Jeffrey showed how to fix the turning issue.

[modernknight1]

Hey Maltacus,

Love the portraits. You should post the mod here. There is that thread called member created mods or something like that. I would like to see your edits to get the ships from spinning. I hope you realize that this is something I myself have already been working on for a very long time and I have already made it MUCH better in that regard than vanilla was. The spin is much slower and there is some forward momentum in the spin so that it is a circle. Each ship has to be edited and I admit I have not got to them all yet. However, if your solution is better than mine I am always wanting to use the better solution.

Please share your edits. I wrote you an email. Do you realize your screenshots are gone? I love your screenshots man. They are the best!

MK

[Maltacus]

It’s all in the technical questions thread, my take at stopping spinning-on-the-spot ships. As I mentioned per e-mail my solution proved to be effective at achieving its goal but it is quite drastic and that makes is somewhat blunt. I’m also not quite sure how realistic it is – it works very good for most of the sailing but ships currently get stuck too much when tacking which isn’t how I would like it.
I’d love to post mods and such but wouldn’t it be a better idea if we could all have some group effort thread or such (maybe there is and I haven’t been looking) to add to the main game bit by bit? For example, I have been planning to go over the ships stats, particularly sail hit points. It wouldn’t work out well if I did that and you did some other revision at the same time. Besides, it might be a way to show lurking readers how inviting it could be to contribute, even with a small contribution.

[Oldtimer]

Hi,

sound approach there, Maltacus. BTW, if you want more problems to solve perhaps ships able to use sweeps should be capable of moving/manouvering in no wind conditions albeit really slow. Visible animated sweeps are of course mandatory…

Rgds,

Oldtimer

[modernknight1]

Extremely busy at the moment but wanted to step in for a few minutes to say I like the idea of a collaborative effort on the long term fix.

However, if we are going to do it I would like to consider everything. Hulls were still blown forward and had to be steered even when all sails had been shot away. Sailors are very familiar with their boats being blown away from the dock (or blown out of the slip) even when no sails are set. This is a good reason for small modern trolling motors.

Imagine the hull of a great ship or galleon and how far out of the water it was. Imagine the force of wind exerted on that great mass even without sails. Why do you suppose that they cut down super-structures so much in the first decades of the 18th century.

I also want to insert the laws of hydrodynamics as well —- Which dictates that a larger vessel with more wetted surface will try to get up on top of the wave that it creates from inertia. That doesn’t just stop if a sail is shot away. In fact it would be hard to stop a larger ship in order to execute a tighter turn than a smaller one and it would be traveling faster than the smaller ship from hydrodynamic forces applied to wetted surface from the outset until the wave beneath it dissipates as the speed slows enough.

The wave itself moves the ship!

This is why the 45 foot yacht will outperform and sail rings around my 25 foot yacht all day long. I will never be able to catch it unless it lost its mast(s).

The game tries to take this into account with the Sea Enchantment number – which has been reduced several times – first by the original GOF team and later by us.

The numbers are far better than they used to be. You will rarely see a ship just sitting there spinning with no forward momentum at all.

So because of this discussion I will start a thread on realistic ship performance tweaks. The final solution may not be 100 percent realistic simply because it is a game and still needs to have some fun factor involved. I have never tried to make it a total simulation.

I will also start a science of hydrodynamics thread with lots of sources that people can look at to understand the mathematics and how they would be applied and what they would actually do to our ships moving forward and in action.

I actually very much enjoy topics/discussions like this one!

MK

• This reply was modified 6 years, 3 months ago by modernknight1.

[Raul]

Personally I have zero idea how you can solve those things and even less idea about how mods are made XD.

Having said that, good luck with it!.

[modernknight1]

…continued.

As far as sweeps are concerned. YES I have been dreaming of that for a long time. I’ve even created a way in my mind that it could work.

Three primary sweep models would be built – small – medium – and large. Each would have animation applied.

Any ship that historically had sweeps (oars) would have the appropriate sweep .GM formatted model named in convention with the model it would be going on. The beginning animation would always show oars as invisible.

The model could be tied for locator purposes to the walk file or another part of the model itself so that the correct height of the sweeps could be established.

An icon would be available if crew strength allows (if you only have a few guys left no oars allowed obviously) that you could push that would begin the sweep animation motion. The second part of the animation would be slow showing the sweeps emerge and extend from the hull and once all the way out they would begin moving at a preset speed(not that fast). Your cannon reload speed numbers would then fall drastically because it would take the majority of the crew involved to move it the vessel by sweeps.

Perhaps when I finally have our agnostic editor built by a genius I’ve yet to find then we will be able to easily insert this sort of thing into our game. Until then I will continue to dream about it.

MK

[ians]

love lots of diiferent characters to choose from from the start..love the varied ship stats even with the same type of ship..love the characters textures..and making my own,dislike having to search for faces online that match the correct angle of the texture file..dislike finding a usable picture of said face,only to find picture has too many bright areas on it..

Not so keen on the 17th century radios that all my victims in the middle of the sea seem to have,so that they can inform their mother country of my new legal status,just as open fire on them….

[Author]

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