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Everyone's thinking it, I'm just saying it..... Pirates!
Pawkets
Member
In the past few months I was lucky to have been gifted Sea of Thieves, and was able to play it for about a month until Skull and Bones launched. I never got to experience things like Archeage naval nor did I ever expect to enjoy any aspect of naval combat (even when it was mentioned to be in Ashes) until I played Sea of Thieves. While there are aspects of both these games that I enjoyed my real hope is what good aspects Intrepid can take from these 2 naval games and what should be left to Davy Jone's Locker.
Also, as I have admittedly low amount of time and experience, please feel free to correct me or add your opinions.
1. Open Seas PVP: One difference between the 2 and that Ashes has already decidedly said that they will do right-- is the open seas PVP, one of the most disappointing things when I swapped to skull and bones was the loss of the thrill of risk. While the constant NPC spawn in Skull and Bones was activity there wasn't the same situational awareness and uncertainty of what other (more dangerous) players are doing around me. This made the game start to feel boring and lackluster something I was missing from the time I played Sea of Thieves.
2. Physics and Personal Investment: When aiming to fight another ship in SoT you target below the waterline to do optimal damage, you try to spread your hits over the entirety of the ship. Making it more difficult to fix and faster to sink. This made combat feel important. It rewarded skill and awareness. When it came to repairing damage you had to use your resources to do so and had to physically go to that location and repair. Making the SaB experience incredibly underwhelming when all you do is click an item in your inventory and instant heal with a cd to your ship. I would also think using materials such as lumber gathered is a better option than players "healing" a vehicle. I would also like to see additional things such as bucketing water or putting out fires that would add to the reason for a crew to be on a ship.
3. Swimming and Boarding: It has been a huge disappointment to see games that are nautical theme or originating that you're not capable of swimming, Which obviously Ashes has already shown this isn't going to be the case. However, something I felt was very rewarding in SoT was how you were not only able to board and fight the other players but you could actively sabotage someone else's ship. Using explosives, cooking a banana, dropping an anchor, looting storage crates, stowaways; these are the things that I loved about that game.
Let me know what you all think on this, or what I missed or got wrong. More and more I am being won over to life on the sea. I hope Ashes continues to make naval gameplay better. Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me.
Also, as I have admittedly low amount of time and experience, please feel free to correct me or add your opinions.
1. Open Seas PVP: One difference between the 2 and that Ashes has already decidedly said that they will do right-- is the open seas PVP, one of the most disappointing things when I swapped to skull and bones was the loss of the thrill of risk. While the constant NPC spawn in Skull and Bones was activity there wasn't the same situational awareness and uncertainty of what other (more dangerous) players are doing around me. This made the game start to feel boring and lackluster something I was missing from the time I played Sea of Thieves.
2. Physics and Personal Investment: When aiming to fight another ship in SoT you target below the waterline to do optimal damage, you try to spread your hits over the entirety of the ship. Making it more difficult to fix and faster to sink. This made combat feel important. It rewarded skill and awareness. When it came to repairing damage you had to use your resources to do so and had to physically go to that location and repair. Making the SaB experience incredibly underwhelming when all you do is click an item in your inventory and instant heal with a cd to your ship. I would also think using materials such as lumber gathered is a better option than players "healing" a vehicle. I would also like to see additional things such as bucketing water or putting out fires that would add to the reason for a crew to be on a ship.
3. Swimming and Boarding: It has been a huge disappointment to see games that are nautical theme or originating that you're not capable of swimming, Which obviously Ashes has already shown this isn't going to be the case. However, something I felt was very rewarding in SoT was how you were not only able to board and fight the other players but you could actively sabotage someone else's ship. Using explosives, cooking a banana, dropping an anchor, looting storage crates, stowaways; these are the things that I loved about that game.
Let me know what you all think on this, or what I missed or got wrong. More and more I am being won over to life on the sea. I hope Ashes continues to make naval gameplay better. Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me.
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Comments
It's a shame that you didn't get a chance to play ArcheAge at launch, it was pretty wild Naval PvP. My expectation for AoC has always been, at least somewhere in between what we got in ArcheAge and Sea of Thieves.
If we get simulation on the same level as SoT, I would be over the moon. But I doubt we will get that level of detail for AoC, at least that's not my expectation.
People typically look at SoT and think that because of the art direction they chose, it's a simple game. Sure it may be simple in scope, but there is a hell of a lot of very complicated physics simulation going on in SoT. This is why I don't have the same expectations for AoC, even though I would love that level of detail/function. I'm sure it's possible to do that for AoC, but there is a whole lot more of the rest of the game they need to sink resources into, be it people, time, or money. The advantage that SoT had is that they only needed to focus on Naval and its related gameplay. Verses AoC and the broad depth of making the monster of a game that AoC is.
That said, what little we do know of can clue us in for some really deep gameplay regarding Naval and its related systems. Take for example the Mariner Classes that are planned. That alone gives some pretty good insight into what we are in for and has some similarities to SoT gameplay, though may not be as granular. We will just have to wait and see!
Wiki Source: https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Mariner_classes
If I remember right from the stream. Ships will not be able to access the areas fresh water boats use. My guess is IS wants to keep these game play separate. Not sure how a caravan could compete with a ship. So I don't think caravans would work on the cost. Could be wrong though.
I hope we get more or less some cool Ship Cosmetics/Aesthetics so that we can let our Ships look Viking-like if we want. Like some really huge Longboats or so.
Because guess what a blonde, blue-eyed Kae'lar with DREADLOCKS, War-Paint in his face and such a Ship on the Ocean's of the World of Verra would look like. 😁 . 😈
Like a Viking. His fellow Players hopefully, too. Vikings -> the first Pirates before " PIRATES " were even named, addressed and acknowledged as such. 😁
Very much looking forward to seeing it.
Archeage had great water combat, I'm hoping they can mix a but of Sea of Thieves water Physics in there, IMO there was no better game for water physics.
https://www.youtube.com/@TheHiddenDaggerInn/featured
Sea of Thieves has MUUUCH "Monkey/Bunny"-Jumping, though. It's been really annoying at Times and taxing on the Nerves, everytime one engages into PvP.
I will be so glad when in the World of Verra, there are less Ways for Players to "dodge" each other. At least i hope it will be.
https://www.youtube.com/@TheHiddenDaggerInn/featured
I managed to get about 10min game play during a demo one time but there were almost no players on the server at the time so never went any further.
Only judging on the visuals from clips.. looks fun with a good team and a populous server.
Also does not look so fun for solo.
But some resemblance for the physics and game play would be great to aim for!
They WILL be in-game!
The sea-based caravans weren't mentioned in the stream about the normal caravan-system. The wiki specifically goes over harbor-to-harbor trade routes, that WILL be on the open water; The mention SS had made in the stream was that naval vessels won't be able to cruise down rivers. However, there will be a system of harbor-to-harbor caravan shipments.
https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Merchant_ships
The mechanics might be weird, since ships won't have collision detection. No idea how it will work, but have posted some questions about it in the monthly Q&A, but have not gotten any clarity.
It has less to do with the combat mechanics in the game and is much more about the player ownership while on their boat. I could imagine in ashes if you were a shipbuilder (before the change where they took this out) you could be a member on the crew that would do primarily the ship repairs while out on sea. You'd have a role to fill and your crew would need you for this.
As for your thoughts on Sea of Thieves, yes, it is a hard game to play alone. It is still very enjoyable but I even just played with 2-3 friends and it is still worth the game.
Was going more for a different movie (Pirates of the Carribean) lol
Curse of the Caribbean Movie Six, when ? ^.^
I did also use their direct quote for the title of this thread /smile
Just imagine having a Ship like this one,
or maybe several or like Ten or so - and then terrorising the Open Sea's of the World of Verra with like +10 to +100 Guild Members as a fearsome Fleet of Pirates.
Wouldn't this be absolutely cuckoo and rad ??
I imagine that ship on a sunny day. The one thing I worry about is how cosmetics will hide skill/ability. Same sort of thing with transmog in wow. In classic you can have a farmers outfit to RP in but they mostly consist of whites and gray gear that aren't very valuable stat wise. However, in retail with xmog you can look like a farmer but wearing absolute BIS gear. In a game like Ashes we will need to identify others to assess the threat, and I am concerned with all the cosmetics interfering with that.
from my understanding you arent supposed to know what gear people are wearing other than the armour type / weapon type, yea you can visually identify a non Xmogged piece of gear once you know what it is but if its a crafted piece it wont matter as it will be different from another piece of the same crafted gear.
not knowing the strength of someones armour and weapons makes it alot better as then if you are gonna attack someone you only know what lvl and armour type they got on but not how strong it could be and makes you rely on your skill more