Open Sea Ship Mechanics and Customization

Hello everybody,

with some of us being shocked, some of us being excited, the Flagging change has been in the forefront of the discussion regarding last month’s livestream.
However, as we are edging closer to Alpha 2 und information regarding the Naval Content, I would like to hear what you would like to see regarding the naval system? Questions that come to mind?
My own wishes/ideas are hidden behind the spoilers so keep the thread easier to read. I’d appreciate some feedback and would love to hear your ideas/preferences.

What would you like in terms of content?

Huge Naval Raid Bosses, that take several ships to kill.
Fishing, both in Coastal (Safe) Areas and Open Sea (PvP Areas) that tie into the alchemy, cooking and enchanting profession or alternatively work the same way hunting certificates do (Price depends on how much said fish was delivered) – no static prices
Treasure Hunting/Diving as wells as underwater caverns, shipwrecks and the floor to explore.
Chasing and Hunting of large sea animals (Whales?) with Harpoons
Roaming NPC Pirates to defeat
Danger in form of weather/storms and different challenges in different seas.

What would you want in terms of ship customization?

First of all, I think there should be multiple tiers of ship types. The first warship you get should not be the last. There should be a progression to be achieved.

Small Boats (Sail Boats, like AA Clippers) for 1 to 4 Player

Warships (each of these with multiple improving tiers/versions, whether they require different amount of people to be operated at 100% can be discussed):

Corvettes - Lightships with very fast speeds but light weaponry (8-16 People) - Great for Chasing Down stuff.
Frigates - Medium Ships which a slower than Corvettes, but more heavily armed (16-24 People)
Heavy Ships which are very slow, but carry heavy weaponry (24-40 People) - Great for defending single points or when brought to a big battle, bad at chasing things down)

Other Boats: Merchant Ships, Rafts, Fishing Boats, Transport Boats…

Ship Customizability

For a game focused on Naval Content, AA really dropped the ball in terms of ship customizability and depth. I really hope, that AoC will provide us with a significantly deeper version, especially considering, that there is an entire profession revolving around it. Things I’d like to see resemble the information we have for the other crafting professions:

Instead of Pre-Built Recipes I would want Modular and Customizable Ships

Provide us with basic ship blueprints, that just define the class and possible load outs of the ship.
The stats and properties of the ship itself should vary depending on the modules, the base material used and the adaptions made by the ship builder so every ship may be unique).

Quality and Player Choice

The Quality/Strength of Parts should depend on, the quality of raw/processed materials used, the shipbuilding skill of the ship builder, the tier of the workbench used by the ship builder. Maybe through a grade system like gear (Common -> Legendary), with higher grades being more expensive to maintain/repair, but also more powerful.

Each tier should have multiple different raw materials, each with their own properties.

Ship Moduls and Parts

Hull:
Personally, I would like to have different weapon types and resistances, like elemental resistances on gear. This would make the choice when building your Ship’s Hull more meaningful and provide a rock-paper-scissor like ship building system, that would prevent from the better geared ship to automatically be the winner. It helps better prepared crews and ship owners to do well when searching specific fights and allows for “dominant” ships to be countered effectively.

https://imgur.com/a/Pqcn1z1

Additionally, the ship builder who builds the hull should have the option to define how massive the hull should be (more massive = more HP, but less speed)

Weapons and Ammunition:
Weapons and Ammunition should follow the same system as the hull. The person creating the weapon parts could be able to balance out range, fire rate, damage per hit and accuracy.
Better Quality Ammunitions = more damage
More Ammunition on board = less speed

Wheel/Rudder:
Different Types of Wood / The Shipbuilder could balance out maneuverability vs. damage resistance.

Storage Unit
Define how much units of different resources you can transport. Small Fish vs. Large Fish vs. Treasures vs. Regular Materials vs. Ammunition vs. …
Obviously, more stuff on board = slower speed.

Sail Mast:
The Sail Mast could define the quality of lookout/sail, that may be placed on the ship and affect, how resistance it is to bad weather/storm/hazards on the water.

Sail:
Based on Material/The Tailor creating it, the speed of the ship the durability of the sail and its effects when damaged as well as the impact of wind may be affected.

Lookout:
Allows for a player to see a greater distance and spot other ships further away. Potentially with extra effects depending on quality.

Common = no effect,
Uncommon = increased viewing distance,
Rare = further increased viewing distance + may identify the owner and crew of another ship,
epic = further increased viewing distance + identifies the quality of resources (fishing and diving spots)
legendary = further increased viewing distance + identifies he loadout of other ships (type of hull, weapons…) + identifies the weakness of certain monsters on the sea

Important: parts should require the source material to be repaired when destroyed (like gear).
This acts as a monetary sink and rewards players when they managed to destroy a highly geared ship of an enemy group.

What kind of weapons and tools should ship feature?

Harpoons to hunt animals or slow/tie down ships.
Grapple Irons, that allow players to safely board another ship when connected.
Variety in Projectile Weapons (Cannon/Potion Launchers?)

What kind of use do you see/want to see for naval mounts over ships?

Solo Travelling to other islands. The ability to temporarily dive under water should help solo players to safely access other islands albeit at a slower pace.
The only form of transportation, that can be summoned while on the water itself. So, you do not have to swim back, catch up when you fall off the ship/disconnect.
Ability to dive when going for treasure hunting / under water exploring.
Support in underwater combat (however that may look)

How would optimal ship combat look to you?

I would prefer actual aiming rather than Tab Target.
Multiple different hitboxes (for cannons, mast, hull etc.) feels unnecessary).
Preferably requiring multiple people to do well. Depending on the ship size.

Im looking forward to hearing your opinions, ideas and maybe other questions.

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Comments

Warth

Formatting this was a real pain in the ass.

Galvyr

Some ideas to come off the top of my heads are:

Deep sea fishing in the open ocean. You can probably get bigger, rarer, and more profitable fish; but you might get attacked as well.

Secondly, I would say that ship repair during combat is a must.

tautau

Wind and currents.

Currents predictably moving in the same patterns. Some different speeds than other.

Wind that moves ships faster with the wind and slower against it. You cannot sail directly into the wind, you have to tack. As players first get small, personal boats they can learn (perhaps through a quest) how this works. Then, as the game progresses and larger ships are built, players can use the wind when sailing. This will get very fun when it comes to naval battles! It will introduce some real strategy.

Also, allow the wind to vary with the seasons. Milder in summer, strong in winter, blustery in spring and fall. Have it connected with the weather system - strong wind during rainstorms and snowstorms, milder in good weather.

Players who learn the currents and wind patterns will be able to use them to increase the speed of their trade routes, decreasing risk. Conversely, pirates who know the sea will have an advantage over landlubbers who don't.

Warth

@tautau

Would you make currents static (always the same in the same spots during the same season) with changes based on season?
Would you show them on the map or do players need to learn/know them.

tautau

HI @Warth
Some currents changing in season might be interesting, particularly in narrow straits.

I would not show them on the map. I would leave them to sharp players to discover. However, once a port node grows enough to have taverns, you could have a salty old NPC in a\the seaside tavern reveal some currents in the area to players who bother to talk to the NPC, or perhaps click on the option to spend a couple of gold to buy them a drink.

Also, we could have indicators, like floating debris and flotsam, which would visually show the currents.

Warth

@Warth

how about wind? should wind be static or ever changing, if so, what would you base the change upon?

Okilian

Sport fishing in the style of AA was fantastic. I love your examples... did a good job with ship customization.

Warth

@TheWolfofGar

Rhorden

I really like the ship customization. I think it would add to your own playstyle and how you would want to fight not to mention that every ship wouldn't look the same and you wouldn't know what you're in for until the fight starts.
Also, need rostrums. There's a certain satisfaction to using someone else's ship as a hood ornament.
Agree with wind pattern, seasons and learning trade routes. Just nothing like the wind in Valheim. That wind sucked. It was almost always straight at me and even though I was always tacking it took forever to get anywhere.

daveywavey

Warth wrote: »

Formatting this was a real pain in the ass.

A real pain in the aft...?

TheWolfofGar

@Warth

Thanks I'll throw my discussion here
from the wiki

Ships may be able to be summoned in rivers (or other bodies of water) depending on the depth of the water

I think a branch of river specific boats could be pretty sweet, such as a "Ferry or barge" looking at the Kaela Riverlands especially having the smaller rivers be inaccessible to frigates or galleons but accessible to ferries, barges and other shallow hulled "river vessels" could make for some interesting rp opportunities for people to set up ferry teams that traverse the shallower waters that the larger deeper hulled military ship types cannot. Some towns/nodes that decide to build harbors on lakes accessible through narrow rivers get the protection of being unable to have frigates on their door step but have the cost of how easy it would be to blockade.

additionally this could be a feature you choose when constructing your ship X hull allows for access to x deep water,
and conversely if you take a river barge onto the open ocean it should have significant speed and other debuffs applied (I'd even accept a "Sea worthiness" stat for ships where if you take a ship of low sea worthiness to the middle of the ocean it can take damage and perhaps be destroyed/capsize.

Just something to consider I think major rivers should of course permit the larger vessels but I do think there should certainly be constraints and we shouldn't see ships like large raid galleons too far inland. I think the notion of having ships specialized for river/coastal transportation vs Open ocean could encourage a variety of ship builds and tell you about the player when you see their ship, if they are sailing a shallow hulled coastal ship they could have a home base further inland than your deep hulled boat meaning if you get them into open ocean you'll have a better chance of overtaking them.

Veeshan

I realy hope cannons on ships act like Darkfall ships cannons where they manualy aimed like an fps and fire cannon balls with a trajectory at where there aimed so you had to arch them and they can be shot quite far assuming u can aim them well enough to hit :P

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