A dissertation about not losing sight of gameplay.

[ronlosey]

For a reference to that fire damage model, start here:


<a href="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=7020&hl" target="_blank">http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/index.php...pic=7020&hl</a>


The ideas on a fire damage pattern and ship hulls are about halfway through the several pages on that topic, and scattered across several posts. If somebody thinks they're good enough a programmer to pin that down, I'll try to come up with some more specific numbers. Summer vacation from school starts this week (as soon as I get grades on the finals - my students are waiting on me), so I might have time to help test the changes too. This is the part of the game that interests me most as well.


On the other comment, the food consumption that "could mess up a trade mission" logic is real - can you imagine telling a bunch of hungry pirates "You can't eat this fruit, boys, cause somebody's waiting on it"? They would keel-haul you. Seriously, put the food items in a priority list - start with "rations" (i.e. normally stored food for sailing), then work down the list to fruit, copra, and leather. (Leather, to represent eating their boots - but you take a big morale hit at this point.) Have them go through the booze starting with rum, and then randomly to wine or ale. If it's a problem for a trade mission, you could turn off alcohol rations as soon as you run out of rum.

Let's not worry about ballast. That's something you carry when you DON'T have enough cargo - and well, players on this game tend to run heavy anyway.

Good swords are expensive - this is true. (I got my tachi pretty cheap - about $80 U.S.- here in Xi'an, as a leftover of WW2, but it would probably go for around $10,000 U.S. at auction. It really is a beautiful blade, and as deadly as anything you ever saw.) However, my point on ships and crew were that ship, cannon, and labor are also expensive. A good sword could cost a year's wage - but what's a year's wage for a crewman (or officer) at the moment? Good cannon were expensive enough to cramp the style of local governors at the time. Pistols were cheap enough that at least most well-off people could afford them. (Same as today - good firearms can get a little expensive, but nothing like military equipment. A long-range missile will always cost more than a hunting rifle.) If a 20-gun ship (i.e. 20 guns at a ton of brass each) does not cost more than 20 pistols, something is seriously wrong.

Anyway, if somebody wants to rework the fire and shot damages, I'm with you.

 

[SuoiveD]

The food consumption issue was the reason I changed the settings in the InternalSettings.h File from

#define FOOD_PER_CREW 0.01

to

#define FOOD_PER_CREW 0.001


It took the hassle out of carrying a lot of Wheat & Rum, especially if you were doing trade runs, because then you had more room in your hold for " Trade Goods ". By changing it, you didnt run out of food & so it didnt affect your crew's morale & they didnt die.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

<!--quoteo(post=151890:date=Jun 23 2006, 01:18 PM:name=Ron Losey)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Ron Losey @ Jun 23 2006, 01:18 PM) [snapback]151890[/snapback]</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->
The frustrating ammo and blade-break mods seem to fall in that category.
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If you don't like these mods, turn them off. I am not going to remove them from the game, because some people, me included, do like them. Somebody had the idea of making several pre-set BuildSettings.h files, so people will be able to choose which gameplay style they want. I think that's a pretty good idea that can be used to make turning off mods easy. Of course, advanced gamers will still be able to set everything to their own personal tastes as well. If we do this, I think everyone should be happy.

<!--quoteo(post=151890:date=Jun 23 2006, 01:18 PM:name=Ron Losey)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Ron Losey @ Jun 23 2006, 01:18 PM) [snapback]151890[/snapback]</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->
Somebody was talking about powder as a trade good - seems micro-managed to me. Don't know if anybody finally added it or not.
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It was added, yes. But it isn't more micromanagement than buying food for your crew. Luckily, there is an auto-buy button in the store interface, which will give you everything you need instantly (including food and powder). Much less management than having to buy enough goods manually. It is some management, yes, but not really micro-management. More like macro-management, I think.

<!--quoteo(post=151890:date=Jun 23 2006, 01:18 PM:name=Ron Losey)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Ron Losey @ Jun 23 2006, 01:18 PM) [snapback]151890[/snapback]</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->
(Did somebody ever fix that? I've been doing weapons advice for another game mod, and missed a few changes here.) Using cargo space for provisions is gameplay.
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I don't think it was fixed yet.
Using cargo space for rations is useless if these rations aren't actually used. If you have rations that are not being used, you might as well decrease the size of cargo space and pretend that the less space is used for rations. I would like to add a purser officer to the game though, who will auto-buy rations in ports, so you don't have to pay attention to it anymore if you don't want to.

<!--quoteo(post=151890:date=Jun 23 2006, 01:18 PM:name=Ron Losey)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Ron Losey @ Jun 23 2006, 01:18 PM) [snapback]151890[/snapback]</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->
Realism in the ship-to-ship combat scene is a good idea. It forces people to think. More realism equals more realistic tactics, instead of just learning to beat the program. However, getting a fire and damage model that feels realistic is a big issue. (I had some work on this in an earlier post, but nobody claimed to be a good enough programmer to implement the model. If somebody wants to try, I'll put it all together again.)
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I don't think the game engine supports an improved fire and damage model. Maybe some things can be changed and improved, but we won't acchieve 100% realism ever.

BTW: What's wrong with adding more things that could happen during land fights? In the stock games, land battles are dull, because it's fire gun-block-attack-block-attack-block, etc. With the gunpowder mod and bladedamage mod, some interesting things can happen. Your enemies' blades could break, your blade could break (and you will have to think quickly about how to survive), you can run out of gunpowder, etc. It forces you to think more about what blade to use as well (you found a badly worn Cardinal's Guard and are level 1. Are you going to use it with the risk of it breaking quickly or are you going to keep it to repair it and use at a higher level, so that it won't break?). It adds a lot of new things to think about. And some people don't like that. But it can be turned off, so that should be no problem, really.

<!--quoteo(post=151890:date=Jun 23 2006, 01:18 PM:name=Ron Losey)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Ron Losey @ Jun 23 2006, 01:18 PM) [snapback]151890[/snapback]</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->
The economy needs to be SERIOUSLY rebalanced. Swords cost more than ships. I mean, forget realism - let's just talk "reasonable". Also, such a rebalance needs to include getting the fleet size down to reasonable. Since when could pirates afford a fleet of Class 1 and 2 ships? Even the British admiralty had trouble maintaining that kind of fleet - and they surely would have never sent it to the Spanish Main. Combat between small ships, usually alone, should be the rule. With such a rebalance, issues of sword breakage or pistol ammo to eat funds and force activity would be unnecessary - the cost of maintaining a warship would be the serious element. If players started doing what real merchant ships did - cutting crew to cut cost - then the economy would be about right.
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Yep. Economy certainly needs to be fixed. That'll be one important point for Build 14.

<!--quoteo(post=151890:date=Jun 23 2006, 01:18 PM:name=Ron Losey)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Ron Losey @ Jun 23 2006, 01:18 PM) [snapback]151890[/snapback]</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->
Somebody said earlier that the weapons needed to be streamlined. I proposed a model where there were very few "good" weapons - each weapon would have better or worse qualities. (The various rapiers would be low-damage, but heavier weapons would be poor for blocking - i.e. clumsy, etc.) Then, like reality with weapons, you could select a weapon based on your personal style. It would eliminate the endless piles of useless weapons, by making them useful for something. (Could still be compatable with the weapon quality settings.) However, this would be a massive project, and nobody volunteered to attack it.
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Interesting and good idea, certainly. That does change the gameplay quite a bit though, so a toggle should be added. Maybe it isn't too much work though. We'd have to choose what blades to keep, then change some settings in initItems.c with an added toggle.

<!--quoteo(post=151890:date=Jun 23 2006, 01:18 PM:name=Ron Losey)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Ron Losey @ Jun 23 2006, 01:18 PM) [snapback]151890[/snapback]</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->
These have all been mentioned earlier. However, work on any of them has been intermittent or non-existant. (I can't really help with the actual mod - I'm just an idea guy, and a lousy programmer at best.) Then de-bugging the current pile of changes has bogged things down (which was when I got busy with some other things and missed some of the action here).
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There aren't too many modders left, so not much has been done. Also: Our priority is fixing gamekilling bugs, then release Build 13. All the things mentioned are certainly good points and I will try to keep these in mind for Build 14 and make use of them as far as possible. However, completely changing the way the game works will probably not happen soon.

I will make some preset BuildSettings.h files for Build 13 that can be used for different gameplay styles, so that people who don't like all food/bladedamage/powder mods can turn them off by simply copying over one file. For Builf 14, we will try to make this work through the options menu. I think that should solve most of people's complaints. The complaints that aren't solved that way, are valid complaints that we will try to incorporate into Build 14.

BTW: For Build 14, I want to make a complete to-do list of all things we want to change as far as gameplay is concerned, including ideas on how to acchieve it. So all your ideas will be incorporated into that to-do list as far as possible. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/yes.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="" border="0" alt="yes.gif" />

Thanks for all your comments. Even though I personally think otherwise about some of them, your input is of great value and will be listened to! <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/doff.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="" border="0" alt="doff.gif" />

 

[ronlosey]

Well, nobody agrees with everybody on everything ... that's what makes a discussion interesting.

A few points need more mention. As for "more stuff that can happen during combat", I would much rather see a more advanced combat tactics system where troops would line up and use muskets, or where you would have to decide between a musket and sword. More realistic damage, to force you to take cover rather than rushing into a hail of gunfire. Larger groups that force you to take crewmen ashore before getting into a fight - instead of the character who thinks he's Bruce Lee, attacking four or five hostiles at a time lone-wolf style. Bayonets and grenades, running and screaming, or taking cover to reload while several guys use you for target practice... that would be "more stuff happening in combat". Having to check if your weapon is sharp and oiled - that's even a hassle in real life. (I just thought of that - I need to oil my practice katana today.)


The fire mod, and the "fire drill" key, prove that the fire damage model can be changed considerably. Changes to ammo and damage prove that we can edit those things - it's been done. We just need to put it all together. However, I'm good with ideas (and weapons) but lousy with a keyboard - I'll come up with the model if somebody else can come up with the code to make them happen. If someone is game for this, start a new thread on it. I'll put together everything I can on fire damage and sailing ships getting hit. If somebody actually understands this code, it shouldn't be that hard to make the changes I'm suggesting.


The food use is about right, both for reality and to keep it a game issue. However, we REALLY need more types of food. It's just too easy for a town to run low of food supplies. Certain types of booze are contraband in some places. That just NEEDS a rework.


If somebody wants to do a streamlined weapons model, I'll put in as much as I can on the subject. However, once again, the actual code is quite beyond me. (Tragically, however, I know a lot about weapons.)


Sorry I'm no help on de-bugging ... but again, I never claimed to be a programmer.
Ron

 

[Pieter Boelen]

<!--quoteo(post=152066:date=Jun 25 2006, 03:27 AM:name=Ron Losey)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Ron Losey @ Jun 25 2006, 03:27 AM) [snapback]152066[/snapback]</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->
A few points need more mention. As for "more stuff that can happen during combat", I would much rather see a more advanced combat tactics system where troops would line up and use muskets, or where you would have to decide between a musket and sword. More realistic damage, to force you to take cover rather than rushing into a hail of gunfire. Larger groups that force you to take crewmen ashore before getting into a fight - instead of the character who thinks he's Bruce Lee, attacking four or five hostiles at a time lone-wolf style. Bayonets and grenades, running and screaming, or taking cover to reload while several guys use you for target practice... that would be "more stuff happening in combat". Having to check if your weapon is sharp and oiled - that's even a hassle in real life. (I just thought of that - I need to oil my practice katana today.)
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Completely changing the combat system would be quite a large undertaking. Also: A lot of it is hardcoded, which means we cannot change it. It might be possible to make the muskets work in such a way that you can't use a musket and blade at the same time. We should then also try and change the AI for a bit, so that some characters will make heavy use of their guns. I am not sure if that can be done, but there are some AI files that might be changed in PROGRAM\Loc_ai\types. I've had a look at those files, but I don't understand it one bit. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/wacko.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":wacko:" border="0" alt="wacko.gif" />

It would be nice to change the character damage system to a more realistic version, where, if you get hit, your stamina will decrease and you won't fight as well as you would otherwise. If your stamina is too low to continue fighting, you'd have to flee, otherwise you'll get killed or knocked out. Once the fight is over, you would need to see a doctor to heal you. Then we can also make hireable doctor officers have some purpose ingame.
This will have to wait for Build 14 though.

<!--quoteo(post=152066:date=Jun 25 2006, 03:27 AM:name=Ron Losey)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Ron Losey @ Jun 25 2006, 03:27 AM) [snapback]152066[/snapback]</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->
The fire mod, and the "fire drill" key, prove that the fire damage model can be changed considerably. Changes to ammo and damage prove that we can edit those things - it's been done. We just need to put it all together. However, I'm good with ideas (and weapons) but lousy with a keyboard - I'll come up with the model if somebody else can come up with the code to make them happen. If someone is game for this, start a new thread on it. I'll put together everything I can on fire damage and sailing ships getting hit. If somebody actually understands this code, it shouldn't be that hard to make the changes I'm suggesting.
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The firedrill mod actually isn't a very large change. The fire damage was increased and the length of a fire was increased. Also the option to extinguish the fire was added. But that was all that was done, really. It might be possible to improve the damage model a bit, but that is really complicated and I, for one, couldn't possibly do it. What kind of new damage would you like to see? Fires onboard? Damaging the rudder? Other things? We already have damaging masts and cannons.

<!--quoteo(post=152066:date=Jun 25 2006, 03:27 AM:name=Ron Losey)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Ron Losey @ Jun 25 2006, 03:27 AM) [snapback]152066[/snapback]</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->
The food use is about right, both for reality and to keep it a game issue. However, we REALLY need more types of food. It's just too easy for a town to run low of food supplies. Certain types of booze are contraband in some places. That just NEEDS a rework.
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Two ways of doing it. 1) Make any type of food be able to be used as rations. 2) Add a new good type into the game: rations.

<!--quoteo(post=152066:date=Jun 25 2006, 03:27 AM:name=Ron Losey)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Ron Losey @ Jun 25 2006, 03:27 AM) [snapback]152066[/snapback]</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->
If somebody wants to do a streamlined weapons model, I'll put in as much as I can on the subject. However, once again, the actual code is quite beyond me. (Tragically, however, I know a lot about weapons.)
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You want a mod where there are only a few different blades in the game and each of them is good at something, right? Removing blades and guns from the game is pretty easy. Also: Changing the amount of damage they do is also pretty easy. Please write down which blades you want to have and how much damage they should do. It should be reasonably easy to make the mod you suggested.
<i>//Badelaire
itm.price = 500; // The item's price
itm.dmg_min = 12.0; // The minimum damage points to the enemy
itm.dmg_max = 16.0; // The maximum damage points to the enemy
itm.piercing = 10; // The % chance that the blade will pierce an enemy block
itm.minlevel = 1; // The mimimum level the main player needs (maybe you want to set it to 1 for all blades, then all blades are available to to the player)
itm.rare = 0.9; // The rarity (the lower the value, the rarer the blade - maybe you want to set it to 1 for all blades, then all blades are available to to the player)
itm.block = 5; // The % chance that the blade will block an enemy's attack</i>

You should decide on some reasonable values for each of the blades you've chosen. You could try to mod this yourself, because it is REALLY easy. Simplest way: Turn the weapon quality mod off (for the time being), remove the blades you don't want from PROGRAM\ITEMS\initItems.c and change the values for the blades you do want. If you start a new game then, you will have only a limited amount of blades and each of them does the damage defined by you.

 

[SuoiveD]

Not everyone would want only just a few blades in the game, I think that if anyone wants just a few blades then they should just tweak the settings in their game. It would be easier in the long run.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Once Ron Losey has coded the mod the way he wants, I can add it into the Post Build 13 mods. But I will add a toggle on it for those who want to keep the blades as they are now.

 

[SuoiveD]

That's good, you would be surprised at the amount of changes I've made to the BuildSettings.h & the InternalSettings.h Files so that I can add a little spice to my game.

 

[ronlosey]

You wouldn't have to "remove" blades to get what I mean - just group them. Make all the rapiers low-damage but good blocking. All the sabers medium performance. All the really heavy swords high damage and block penetration, but weak on defense (i.e. clumsy). Within each group, there could be some variation - some blades will still be better than others - but not a huge degree. Even the "best" of each basic class would still have a significant strength and a serious weakness. That would create a "style" (to coin a martial arts term) - a way of fighting unique to the type of weapon. It would also eliminate the "worthless blade" effect - a slight advantage would be nice, but a weapon without it would still not be "worthless".

I'll see what I can come up with. However, don't hold your breath. I've got a few things going on right now. (I'm advising on weapons for another game, trying to end the school term, and now we have a very real campus security issue that I need to handle.) (The security issue I mentioned is going to get REAL bad, I'm afraid - I may have to carve some fool like the Christmas goose to keep him off of my students.) It may be a while before I can get that tweaked.


For a fire damage model, it needs three changes:

First, damage should be high on crew and cause secondary explosions/damage guns, but it should damage hull slowly. Historically, ships burned for hours. They cooked the crew in minutes, but the burning (surrendered, I guess) ship would set there and burn for half a day. You couldn't really board it - there was nothing to do but watch it burn. You might be able to board long enough to save some cargo or crew, if you were brave and quick - but that seems unsafe.

Second, fire should go out as a factor of how much crew you have, and possibly your defense skill. (Drop the magic "fire drill" button - fighting fire takes time.) That is, a lot of guys fighting fire make it a minor threat. A small crew on a large ship almost ensures that they will be overwhelmed. Say, put out 1 fire per 5 seconds, times % of max crew, times defense skill/10. Full crew and perfect skill would get one fire per 5 seconds. Full crew at def skill 1 would only get 1 fire every 50 seconds - so unless they got lucky, they're probably toast. May have to adjust that, but it's a random starting point.

Third, fire that is not controlled should have a chance of creating more fires. (Say, up to ten per ship - that would be enough to deliver the message that the whole ship was in flames.) The longer fire is allowed to spread, the bigger it gets, and the harder it becomes to control. Say, 50/50 chance every 30 seconds of a new fire forming. Again, that may need to be adjusted.

Now, just because I can't write this code (I NEVER get all the punctuation in the right places), these changes seem farily small compared to what was changed in other mods. I'm confident somebody can do this.

Fire is deadly on a ship, this is true. However, burning through the bottom of the hull is the last and least likely thing to happen. Heat rises, after all.

To go with this, guns that do more crew damage and less "hull" (i.e. chance of sinking) damage would seem appropriate. Round ball passing through your ship would likely kill every living thing on board hours before you could actually "sink" anything. Taking water should be a random fluke. Having a ship shot into splinters until it was worthless (but still floating) - that would be more common. About the only way to sink one of these ships should be to burn it to the waterline. That should keep ships in the fight a little longer too, which will keep the action lively.


That was my theory on fire, realism, and gameplay.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I think your suggestions on ship damage are pretty possible. Now let's hope there'll be some modder who wants to mod it for Build 14. I'll put it on the Build 14 to-do list. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="" border="0" alt="smile.gif" />

As for the blades: I thought the point was to have less blades in the game as well to prevent the inventory of being overly filled with dozens of blades. Anyway: I would recommend you to try and mod it yourself, because it's really easy: Just remove some code (if you want) and change some values. You don't need to write any new code at all. Once you got it done, I'll add it into the modpack with a toggle.

 

[ronlosey]

I'll see what I can do with the blades. May be a while.

As for "less blades" - I think the complaint was about piles of worthless junk. It's not the number of blades, but the number of BAD blades that ticks everybody off. There are always 50,000 garbage weapons before you get to anything even remotely useful. If it was gameplay-feasable to actually use some of those weapons, the number of different ones would be non-fatal. If some of those weapons actually had advantages, that would be even better.

If it works out, we might want to do the same things with guns - some are higher damage, some better accuracy, some reload faster or slower - so "better" depends on what you plan to do with them.

The idea was to turn non-useful objects into significant parts of the game. Create choices, instead of just ballast in the inventory window. Choices equal gameplay - people faced with choices must make decisions and then try to live with them. That is the RPG theme in a nutshell.

Either way, if such a plan takes forever and a day to materialize, it's not a game-ending error. Just a thought.
----------------------

Much more seriously, who wants to work with the fire/damage model? The current one really does go against reality, and puts some odd quirks in the way it plays too. I'll help test and suggest tweaks, but I need somebody who can use this code.

(If Pieter says he's not really up to making these changes, I think that means I need somebody who's a DARN good programmer. When the guy who assembled this mod pack says it will be tough....)

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I wanted to add a new attribute to blades: fragility. Depending on this, it can break very quickly or can take a looong time to break. That'll make blades a bit more distinctive. I also want to add some sort of magical blade that will never break, but won't do major damage either.

<!--quoteo(post=152134:date=Jun 25 2006, 04:43 PM:name=Ron Losey)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Ron Losey @ Jun 25 2006, 04:43 PM) [snapback]152134[/snapback]</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->
If Pieter says he's not really up to making these changes, I think that means I need somebody who's a DARN good programmer. When the guy who assembled this mod pack says it will be tough....
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I am no good programmer at all. I can put mods together, but I am not good at making major new mods. The only major thing I ever did was the bladedamage mod and that one still isn't working right.

 

[LarryHookins]

The frequency with which ships sink is a gameplay issue, not a reality issue. There's nothing you can do with a burning ship except avoid it. A sinking ship leaves cargo you can pick up and passengers you can rescue. And simplifies the map: no extra ship hanging around. And becuse it's a GAME, people expect ships to sink once in a while.

How many ships burned at Trafalgar? While fire on board a ship is devastating, it's not something you run across very often. I have fires turned off in my game.

The main idea is not to see how MANY features we can put in the game, but how FEW features we can get away with and still have a good game. New features that don't offer the player more options on how to play do not help the game, but hurt it. This is a general rule of thumb however, and a lot of things can be added that won't hurt. The trick is knowing what hurts.

Grand Theft Auto is a good example of having a lot of things in the game to give the player a lot of options on how to play without adding useless junk. One of the good things about Grand Theft Auto is that the character didn't have to put up with details like having to buy fuel for his cars. Just an example.

Hook

 

[ronlosey]

Again, I don't really suggest "adding" features. I just say to change the ones that are there. In the case of fire, get rid of that annoying "white phosphorous burns through bottom of the hull" effect and replace it with fires that could either spread or be put out. That way it's not just a "push button" or a "wait and it will go away" - it's an actual issue of being prepared to take some damage. It's a darn good reason to put some skill into defense.

And as for history, I don't remember the numbers on Trafalgar, but a BUNCH of ships burned at the Nile, including the French flagship. As far as I know, none of them sank from hits at or below the waterline. Maybe fire is too common at the moment, but I think that can be tweaked too.

Danger of fire also puts a risk management in place - if a ship IS burning and surrenders (or can be taken by force), do you take a chance on boarding it and trying to control the fire, or do you let it burn?

On an unrelated note, bombs for ship guns and mortars in the 1690's were wood kegs of powder and/or Greek fire, tar, or naptha. They exploded or burned violently, but they were horribly short-range and inaccurate shot. It might be worth the time to add them back in - at very least, it could discourage boarding attempts. (The iron-case bombs in the original version did not really appear until the 1800's.) That would add to a good fire model, if only certain types of attack were likely to cause fire. (Round ball doesn't really burn much, but if you really wanted to burn something, you could.)

 

[LarryHookins]

If I remember right, the Battle of the Nile was fought against ships anchored "on springs" so that they could be turned so their guns could be brought to bear. This situations lends itself to use of fire ships.

I'm sure the game could be modified so that ships *never* sank. But what kind of pirate game would that be? People expect ships to sink, whether it's realistic or not.

One of the things I was most thankful for when I got the builds was that bombs had been removed. I'm sure you could find a way to add them back if they're that important to you.

As for fire, I have it turned off in my game. If it needs tweaking, the necessary variables should be in Buildsettings.h.

Hook

 

[SuoiveD]

<!--quoteo(post=152243:date=Jun 26 2006, 12:35 PM:name=Hook)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Hook @ Jun 26 2006, 12:35 PM) [snapback]152243[/snapback]</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->
.............................

<u>One of the things I was most thankful for when I got the builds was that bombs had been removed. I'm sure you could find a way to add them back if they're that important to you.</u>

As for fire, I have it turned off in my game. If it needs tweaking, the necessary variables should be in Buildsettings.h.

Hook
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Very very easy to turn them on........ I like to tweak the settings so that I have lots of fun, when things become boring I play around with different settings, BUT, I always save all the settings before I start tweaking....lol

 

[ronlosey]

My point on fire was not that ships "never" sink, but that a lot of other very bad things would happen to them first. Which is more gameplay? A game where ships go down like blowing beer bottles out of the river? (That's a hoot, if you've never tried it.) Or wood ships that can get shot to splinters, and still have a few determined crewmen trying to defend her? Which one carries the spirit of the days of wooden ships? Which one makes the fights interesting?

My comments about the bombs were a slightly different case. In their case, reality was balanced. Trying to fire a keg of gunpowder at someone was possible, but usually infeasable (unless you were attacking castle walls or massed infantry from a fixed mortar position). Round shot was more reliable - it gave better range and more immediate effect than trying to burn an enemy ship. The bombs (that were 200 years too advanced for the rest of the game) got removed because they screwed up balance. I said they could be returned if they were historically balanced to what was in use in 1690.

On that note, there is another serious suggestion. Why can ships still turn effectively when stopped or near stopped? Rudders require water to be moving over them to turn the ship, which requires forward (or backward) movement. This failure of physics makes attacks to sails almost useless, as ships can still sit and turn to fire. A ship with the sails destroyed should be unable to turn effectively, which would allow an attacker to come around and rake them lengthways without fear of significant retribution. This was the use and tactic of chain/bar shot and attacks to rigging. We don't have it right now.

I still think realism offers the best gameplay, at least on the ship-to-ship scenes.

 

[SuoiveD]

If you put too much " Realism " into a game, especially a game that is based around the 16th - 17th century, the game tends to become less fun.

It's nice to make nice things & such, but when there is too much realism in any GAME then it becomes less fun to play.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Maximus was once working on a fun little feature where, after boarding, you can set fire to the enemy ship and have it burn until it sinks. He didn't finish it yet, but it should be reasonably easy. How do you people like that idea? Maybe, after boarding, you get the choice of letting the ship go, blowing it up (by setting fire to the powder magazine) or burning her until she sinks. Also fun: Take all crew members, but let her go. Then she's just a floating object without anybody sailing her. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/icon_mrgreen1.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="" border="0" alt="icon_mrgreen1.gif" />

 

[SuoiveD]

I like both those options Pieter, it puts a bit of fun back into the game. Bit like it was in the movie POTC - Curse of the Black Pearl, blowing up the ships after boarding & sacking them. Take the crew, goods, weapons, etc & then having the option to blow it up or burn it or let it become a floating hulk.